


The Shadow of Right and Truth

by tisfan



Series: Lost in the Shadows [2]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Shadowrun, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Alternate Universe - Shadowrun Fusion, Corporate Espionage, M/M, Minor Clint Barton/Natasha Romanov, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, better than life chips
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-22
Updated: 2020-09-25
Packaged: 2021-02-27 18:26:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 11
Words: 24,513
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22850188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tisfan/pseuds/tisfan
Summary: In the year 2078, magic has returned to the world. Governments have collapsed and the world is ruled by the mega corporations. Mythological beings, elves, dragons, trolls, and native spirits have returned. Inside the Matrix, a vast, network of computers and AIs, a million times more powerful than the Internet, battles between mortal deckers and hostile ICE AIs rage. A shadowrun – a successful data theft or physical break-in at a rival corporation or organization – is one of the main tools employed by both corporate rivals and underworld figures.An elite Shadowrun team makes a strike way outside their territory, where they have no friends, no contacts, and no jurisdiction, to set right old wrongs and to bring something darker into the light.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Tony Stark
Series: Lost in the Shadows [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1642675
Comments: 95
Kudos: 93
Collections: Marvel Trumps Hate 2019





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TeganJ](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TeganJ/gifts).



> This story will post one chapter every time I finish the new chapter (with some wiggle room in there, since I just finished writing Chapter Four). 
> 
> Thanks to Tegan for their support and encouragement. I have to say I'm impressed. The end goal is to write about 13 chapters and a projected length of 25k to 36k.
> 
> I've got an outline written up, and I'm not sure if this fic will have explicit adult material in it (aside from violence, which is inherent in the system), If it does, I will adjust the rating accordingly.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Winter Soldier, Iron Man, Hawkeye, and Black Widow are on a dangerous mission; find who is using the BTL chips and murdering sex workers in the Barrens.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You do not have to read the first 2 parts of this series for this story to make sense, but you might want the background information anyway.

Seattle’s weather was volatile, even on the best of days. If by volatile, you meant rainy, cold, and windy. And, these days, especially in some of the lower rent areas, toxic. There were not nearly as many air purifiers in the lesser districts to scrub disease, radiation, and the occasional hostile nanobot cloud left over from one of the tech wars.

Tony’s nanobot blood filtration system was as good, or better, let’s be honest, than anything out there on the general market, and a damn sight better than most black market tech. Half the population here couldn’t even afford the shitty tech that might let them live past forty.

“JARVIS, file something with Miss Potts, I want to run a clinic of anti-virals and anti-rads in the Barrens area. Nothing flashy, I don’t want to just start up a shadow clinic where they bring in dead people to drain their blood like some modern day vampire. Advertise it as… I don’t know, measles vaccinations.”

“Of course, sir,” JARVIS said in his ear. “May I remind you, sir, of your role, and that talking to yourself is going to look bad?”

Tony huffed a sigh and pushed further into his corner. He was barely dressed for indoors, much less outside, at night, on the streets. A sheer mesh shirt covered his chest -- sort of -- and drew attention to his nipples; the arc-reactor in his chest had been artistically hidden as the base for a subdermal tattoo.

The rest of his enhancements were mostly nanotech or bioware; not visible from outside his skin, which is what Bucky, feared on the streets as the razerboi Winter Soldier -- had used as an argument for why Tony was going to be their bait. His cyber arm was both noticeable and hard to disguise. No street kitten would have work like that done, none of them would be able to afford it. 

“Besides,” Bucky had said, his rich, Russian accent tingling down Tony’s nerves, “I do not have the skillsoft for _act like a prostitute_.”

“And you think I do?” Tony had demanded.

“No, for you, it comes naturally,” Clint Barton-- street name, Hawkeye, and Tony still wasn’t sure that Clint was his real name, either. The elf hid secrets like a dragon -- had stuck in his three nuyen and Tony supposed he walked right into that one.

Honestly, it wasn’t a terrible plan, even if Tony was cold, and felt ridiculous in the joyboi outfit that Natasha Romanoff -- known by her street name as the Black Widow -- had put together for him.

Tony supposed he was lucky enough that the rest of his usual team, Captain America, Thor, Loki, Hulk, and sometimes Falcon, weren’t drawn in for this particular run. He didn’t want to face Rogers after wearing a costume that showed off his ass. He thought he had no shame left, and perhaps that was true, but still, Rogers was a bit of a self-righteous prig sometimes, and while he was very, very good at what he did, a lot of the time what he did was annoyed Tony.

So, good that he was unavailable, at least for this mission.

Which wasn’t going to happen unless the particular John they were looking for happened by, and happened to think Tony was exactly the right kind of street worker.

Pretty, but vulnerable. Needy.

Alone.

It was cold as balls out -- speaking of which, Tony was quite sure that his were never going to be the same after this -- and rainy besides. 

There wasn’t a person in Seattle more vulnerable and alone than Tony was.

“Got someone coming up the street,” Hawkeye murmured in Tony’s comm unit. “Look pretty. And hungry.”

“I am pretty,” Tony snarked, but before JARVIS could remind him again that he was not supposed to be talking to himself, he pushed himself away from the wall and put on his come fuck me look. It was, he’d always thought, rather effective. Although it did usually have the clout behind it of billions of nuyen, which could make someone ugly attractive. Since Tony was always naturally blessed in good looks, and had learned a particularly charismatic manner, his billions had still usually been the top reason he was sought as a bed partner, but not the _only_ one.

“Lookin’ for a good time?” Tony called out, letting his voice catch; desperate, needy.

Vulnerable.

If the guy turned out to be just another John, Tony would lead him back to his supposed crib, where Bucky and Clint would scare him off. If he was…

Well, if he was the one they were looking for, things would get fun, real quick-like.

Also, warmer, which Tony thought would be good before his fingers, nose, and cock fell off.

The SINner barely even looked in Tony’s direction, which was just insulting. He didn’t get all tarted up to be ignored. He put a little extra sensuality in his walk. “I could show you a good time,” Tony insisted.

The man went to scoff, and then actually gave Tony the once over. “Bet you could,” he said, somewhat kinder. “I’m not looking for entertainment tonight.”

That was a lie, everyone in this district was looking for something. Work, or fun. But even if it was, nothing they’d gathered about their target led anyone to believe he’d defer.

Tony let the man go about his business, whatever it was.

He sulked, dragging himself back to his barely sheltered walkway; the rain was falling faster, harder, and he wasn’t sure how much more of this that he could stand before they had to go with _he’s just not going to show tonight_.

The chipset, which Tony had watched several times, had a distinct methodology, and the man probably wouldn’t be able, much less want, to go against its programming. 

Bucky had told him some about it, back when he and his sister were Hydra. It wasn’t the same sort of chip, but it was close enough.

“It feels good,” he had said, “to do what the chip tells you. It triggers serotonin and endorphins, along with a low grade painkiller. You do what it tells you because it feels so good.”

“Eventually,” Natasha had added, “you can’t refuse; your body’s not producing its own feel goods anymore. It’s an addiction, and then some.”

Tony didn’t know how the two of them had escaped that life, only that they had and he was grateful for it. Still mulling it over, Tony turned to put his back to the wall--

Hands grabbed him, putting one over his mouth and the other reached around his waist. The sure grip the man had said _move, and you’re dead, neck broken_. And then the hand moved south, pawing at Tony though the thin fabric.

The actual assailant said, his voice a reassuring croon, “come on, pretty boi, want to make a quick hundred yen?”

“You didn’t have ta scare me to death first,” Tony said, scolding, but in a flirty way. He stepped back to eye the man. “What’s your game? You need a little pick me up?” Tony leaned into the touch, keeping it from being too tight against his middle.

That much they didn’t have, a description; but JARVIS could do a bioscan and hopefully pull enough data to --

“We have a match, sir,” JARVIS said in his ear. “That’s the Hammertech chip he’s wearing.”

Tony went to signal for the suit, the nanotech would come to him, molding armor and weapons around him--

“Sir, he’s blocking our signal--”

“Game,” the man said in Tony’s ear, a frisson of cold running down Tony’s spine. “The last game there is. Cleaning up the mess.”

* * *

Known to many by his street name of Winter Soldier, Bucky watched the feeds with laser intensity. Tony had been bait for catching a serial killer.

And not just any serial killer, but one of the most famous, most legendary serial killers of all times. Jack the Ripper.

Which might have been just hype, except that, of course, it wasn’t the real Jack the Ripper. Child’s play, catching a killer from the 1800s. This was the legend, made up from every story and tall tale, every celluloid film and every holovid. A mastermind, never caught, the legend. Programmed with every nuance they could find.

The worst part was that, supposedly, this was for _entertainment_. It wasn’t that people wanted to try to catch him. No, no, people wanted to pretend to be _Jack the Ripper_.

Bucky had considered the implications of the intentions to be almost as disgusting as what happened. Why are people so obsessed with serial killers? They are nothing more than men who hate women and feel entitled.

And what had happened was even worse.

The chips were supposed to provide a shell dimension in the Matrix, to let the people who paid to _be_ Jack the Ripper wander around foggy ol’ England and murder prostitutes, taunt Scottland Yard, evade capture. It was supposed to be _virtual_.

What had happened instead was that the chips bonded to their user. Instead of putting the user in a virtual world, it dragged the Jack the Ripper persona into the real world, let the chip’s embedded persona control the poor sod who’d slotted it.

Brought Jack the Ripper back to life.

Sixteen prostitutes had died before Hammertech even admitted they knew what was going on, and only in back channels.

They wanted to chip back.

And they hired to best to track down a near impossible-to-find killer. Retrieve the chip at all costs.

Tony had taken then job; him, Clint, Sam, and Bucky.

THey had to get that maniac off the streets at all costs. The chip, Tony said, was secondary.

The nice thing about their shadowrun team, even if Hammertech didn’t know it, was that they didn’t need the money. They couldn’t be bought.

They’d do what was right.

And as Tony said, what was right was getting that chip off the streets.

It was possible, even, that after this part of the run, they’d go up against Hammertech and take out the specs and plans and prototypes.

Because this was _dangerous_ fragging tech.

“What’s your game, you need a little pick-me-up?” Tony said, and Bucky watched at the John approached. It was the best idea, because Tony could, in fact, sell the role, and the worst idea because Bucky was seethingly jealous. He wanted to smack the shit out of people who looked at his husband like that--

“Sir… we have a match,” JARVIS said, and then there was a crackle and pop and all the feeds went dead.

A moment later, they came back online, but the John, and Tony, were gone.

“JARVIS, launch drones, find them,” Bucky ordered.

“Yes, Sergeant,” JARVIS said, using Bucky’s very old rank from when he’d been in the UCAS army.

A few explosions later and Bucky was already running for the street where Tony had been. “Hawkeye!”

“He’s got drones, they’re--” Hawkeye yelped, leaping from rooftop to rooftop like a ninja, his hands never failing to pluck arrows from his quiver, arrows never failing to find their targets. “My wife is on her way.”

“Da, is good,” Bucky said, and then he was in the middle of combat, blasting the small, lethal machines out of the air. They were primarily focused on JARVIS’s tracking bots, which was probably why Bucky lived more than the first three minutes of that fight, and then Hawkeye was there, and between the two of them, they cleared a hole.

_Thermal vision activated._

Bucky scanned the ground. It was cold as hell and rainy, but there were smudges of color, red and yellow, fading out, that gave him a direction, and Bucky could only hope that it was the right one. “Come on, come on, damn it.”

“Behind you!” 

Bucky didn’t even turn; the smartgun link in his palm was state of the art, and Tony had improved it at least a dozen times already.

The drone exploded with a mechanical scream.

“James,” his sister said, her voice a dream in his ear. “Look left.”

She was, of course, in the astral realm, and she could see things that he and Hawkeye could not. He hoped like dreck that someone was watching her fraggin’ meatbody while she was doing it. There was nothing worse for a mage than coming home and finding out your body’d been moved.

But they didn’t have much time for an extended conversation. It was hard enough to talk through the astral realm as it was, much less to someone who was almost as much machine as man. Three words and she was done, her presence gone from his mind as she fled back to her body.

Bucky followed her instructions and found a smear of blood, not much. He might not even have noticed if she hadn’t said something; some trash and crates had been hastily dragged over it. He bent, touched the blood and stuck the wet finger in his mouth. 

_Analyze. Match, Anthony E. Stark._

“Got him,” Bucky said. 

Hawkeye finished blowing up the rest of the drones. “Boomerang arrow,” he said, reaching out a hand to catch it as it flipped back to him, knocking out the last drone. 

“That is the stupidest thing I ever heard.”

“Boomerang. Arrow. Chummer. Suck it, your husband made it for me,” Hawkeye said. 

He shoved the crates and debris aside. Knocked on the wall, listening. It seemed hollow behind it.

“There’s probably a fulcrum switch or--”

Bucky cocked his arm back and smashed it through the wall, yanking the secret door right off its secret hinges and threw it aside.

“Not subtle, Soldier.”

“Frag subtle,” Bucky said. “Lucky I didn’t throw a grenade at it.” He stared into the dark passage that probably led down into the Ork Underground.

“We’re really going down there?”

“ _Elves_ ,” Bucky muttered like it was a dirty word.

“That sounds like a yes.”


	2. Chapter 2

Just once, Tony thought it would be nice to wake up in a soft bed with some lovely, bored heiress asking him how his head felt, and if he’d like some wine.

Kidnapping never seemed to go that way, however. Maybe he’d watched too many holoromances as a boy.

“Frag,” he managed. His mouth tasted like something had died in there.

His shoulders hurt, too, and it took him a moment to realize why. Instead of the typical chair or bed, he’d been -- Tony turned his head to one side and squinted -- zip-tied to a fucking bedframe. Which was standing on end. Instead of sitting or laying down while he was unconscious, he’d been strung up, and was dangling from his wrists. It’d be weeks and at least two appointments with his chiropractor to fix that dreck.

On the plus side, he was still alive, which is more than he expected. One of these days, he was going to wake up dead and that was going to be the end of a short and not particularly heroic career.

But in the end, he had been kidnapped more than most people, and he continued to live longer than most of his kidnappers, so that was good. Alive was a start.

Tony let his gaze travel around the room; underground, he thought, based on the pressure in his ears, the smell of recycled air and bad filters. Still, there was a window, even if it was papered over and the sound that came through it sounded like street traffic. 

Orkish Underground, Tony decided. The whole city had sunk, and eventually what had been houses and towns had been built over, and the remains, along with old sewers and tunnels and smuggler’s dens had become a town of itself. The elves and orks and dwarves had fled there during the initial goblinization (UGE, Tony corrected himself, but dreck, no one called it that) when they were hunted and killed.

Eventually, elves and dwarves had formed their own communities, wrenched land away from the humans and built kingdoms.

The orks and trolls, however, were still barely tolerated. Oversized, ugly, violent, they clustered in the underground and at the edges of the cities, hired for their brawn rather than their brains.

But in the Underground, they could have some sort of community.

Tony had never been much into Orkish culture. Smart, rich, human. He was everything that the Orks should have been allowed to have and weren’t. He wasn’t a guttersnipe to spend a few teenage rebellious years in some of the street gangs that edged in on Orkish territory.

Which meant, even if he got away from his captor, he was probably still screwed. There was no reason for the Orks to help him, and every reason for them to be just another danger.

_Deal with the problems in front of you, Stark._

Problem one: JARVIS was offline, which meant Tony was either in some sort of shielded area -- it was possible that the metal bedframe was causing interference with the signal, or the guy had an advanced scrambler nearby.

Problem two: which really was an addon from problem one. Bucky and the rest of his team probably didn’t know where Tony was, which meant rescue was either not forthcoming, or it was going to be late.

Problem three-- well, he hadn’t gotten that far before he heard a sound. A scrape of foot against the floor. Tony went limp in his bonds and tried to pretend he wasn’t awake. Sometimes that would gain him an advantage. He just needed to find the advantage.

It didn’t help that he wasn’t sure what his captor _wanted_. The Jack the Ripper chipset was supposed to encourage violence and a certain degree of smug insanity. There was nothing in the programming for long term capture, or torture. Jack didn’t do that. He murdered the joibois and prostitutes and then carved them up. None of them had ever shown signs of being dragged away.

“Are you awake, Mr. Stark?” a voice said, and Tony jerked involuntarily at the sound of his name, at which point he’d given himself away, so he might as well look.

The guy was lean, good looking in a wage-slave sort of way. Not someone that Tony would have associated with Jack the Ripper, but that was the whole idea, right? That these weren’t actually Jack or any of the others, they were malfunctioning BTL chips that had enslaved probably perfectly innocent people that Hammer Industries had tested them on.

Tony needed to remember that; this wasn’t an actual murderer or madman. It was a malfunctioning chip, built wrong, that was forcing him to act that way.

“Could use some soycaf,” Tony said, “if you want actual, you know, awakeness.” 

“I keep thinking I know you, that I know you, I know you,” the man said, practically babbling. “Why would I know you? Mr. Stark. Mr. Tony Stark--”

Tony couldn’t shrug, not the way he was tied up. “I don’t know. Maybe if you tell me who you are, I can help you. Come closer, I can’t see.”

Establishing some sort of bond. This man wasn’t a killer--

He stepped closer. A close trimmed beard, dark hair with a hint of sun bleached highlights -- not something he could have gotten in the Underground, but maybe they were salon-purchased -- and deep sapphire blue eyes. He was, in fact, rather good looking.

“Nevermind,” the man said. “Now that I’m closer, I don’t know you. You’re just a sinner, one of the filth and degraded and disgusting--”

“Beck?” Tony inhaled in shock. “Quentin Beck?”

The man had been a wage mage back at Stark Industries on the east coast. God, years ago. It must have been at least ten years, if not more. 

The east coast branch. 

Which wasn’t run by Tony anymore, but by his former partner and betrayer, Obadiah Stane.

But Beck had been a member of one of Tony’s teams, a long time ago. He’d worked rather closely with the man on some augmented reality programs that mingled tech and magic. The line had been abandoned after it proved untenable, and--

“Shit. _Beck_.”

Beck had been unstable; when the plug had been pulled from the project he’d become verbally abusive at first, and then actually struck a coworker. His disappointment had been unreasonable. The project was unstable, the simulations showed that the ordinary psyche could be easily overwhelmed by the chip.

So, _of course_ he’d taken his ideas and gone elsewhere with them. And because brilliant madmen could always be counted on to find greedy industrialists, he’d ended up in Justin Hammer’s tender care. Hammer wouldn’t have minded the risk, wouldn’t have worried about potential side effects. All Justin Hammer craved was money and power.

So here was Beck, at the mercy of one of his own creations. Thinking he was Jack the Ripper, which was bad. But underneath, he was Quentin Beck, a man who did not have fond memories of Tony Stark. Which, might possibly, have been worse.

_Oh, I am so fragged._

* * *

There was a drum circle going on, somewhere in the underground. Bucky could feel it in his bones more than actually hearing it. People. A party.

Which meant Tony might have been seen, along with whoever took him. There weren’t terribly many corridors off the main branch leading down, and both Clint and Bucky had checked them for tracks or signs of blood.

The chanting, singing grew stronger.

They found themselves on the edge of a huge block party of some sort -- Bucky would have called it a pow wow if they were Nations, but they weren’t. Trolls and orcs, a few gnomes, which were rare. An actual fragging minotaur -- Bucky’d thought those guys were _myths_.

“Stay here,” Clint said, putting an arm over Bucky’s chest and pushing him against the wall. “Orks don’t like elves much, but at least we were part of this community once.”

 _Whereas, chums like me drove them down here._ Bucky knew the lore. It was decades ago, and if Bucky was as human as he looked, he wouldn’t have been alive for the initial UGE, but he was a lot older than he looked, and he remembered a time when there weren’t any trolls or orcs or elves, and dragons were a pretty bed time story.

Humans had been the bad guys then, too.

“Urban shamans,” Clint said, low and rough. “They’re not going to want to see you.”

Some sort of prayer meeting, then-- the shamans would call on spirits of nature or spirits of the city, for blessings or help. More than just spell slinging like a mage could do. This was religion and miracles and magic all at the same time.

Not something a teched out to the teeth razorboi could understand. Certainly nowhere that he’d be welcomed.

The orks didn’t have their own language. Not like elves, who’d resurrected some ancient language. But about half of them knew elvish, even if, like the French, they wouldn’t admit it. Clint was speaking it now, squatting to talk to a gnome. Bucky’d never met a gnome before. He wondered if the rumors about their tech skills were just rumors, or if they really were prodigies. Probably mostly stereotyping. 

“You’re pretty,” someone said, and Bucky had to push back at his move-by-wire to keep from drawing a gun and shooting them.

That would be bad while they were trying to be subtle. Or at least, pass through without a fight. 

Bucky looked up. And up some more.

The person addressing him was tall, not quite as huge as a troll, but at least seven and a half feet. She -- because it was a woman -- batted huge cow eyes at him. Literally. She was the minotaur Bucky’d seen earlier.

“Hi?” Bucky managed. She was shirtless, but it didn’t matter. Her skin was covered with dark black and white hair. If she had human tits, Bucky couldn’t tell, and quite frankly, didn’t necessarily want to know about that. 

“Haven’t seen you around before,” she said.

“I’m looking for someone.”

“Found someone, then, mission accomplished,” she said. “I’m Agelada.”

 _Really_? Cow. In Greek. Bucky’s eyebrows shot up. He coughed to cover his surprise. “People call me the Winter Soldier.”

“Did your parents give you that name?”

“Did yours?” 

“No,” she admitted. “They called me Bessie. Right before they put me out on the street.”

“Sorry. My name’s Bucky.”

“Nice to meet you,” Agelada said. “Who are you looking for?”

“One man, possibly two. One’s underdressed for the weather, a prostitute, but he might have been wrapped up, drugged, or unconscious.”

“I might be able to tell you, if you’ve got a flower for me,” Agelada said, leaning against the wall. There was something very disconcerting about words forming out of a bovine mouth, the way those lips wriggled around the sounds like they were particularly tasty cud. Bucky knew he was probably being really speciest, and she was being very nice and possibly helpful. But fragging drek it was weird. Wait, flower?

Bucky shouldered his rifle, glanced around the space. He plucked a poster from the wall advertising Concrete Dream’s latest concert. “You look like a water lily sort of girl,” he said. He hadn’t done this in a long time, but he smoothed the poster out and started folding. It was one of the few things he’d learned that hadn’t been forced on him, hadn’t been part of his training, his molding and conversion from lost orphan boy to Fist of Hydra. Something he’d learned to do because it was pretty, and he wanted to.

By the time the lily had taken shape in his hands, Bucky had attracted several more of the underground inhabitants who wanted and made soft, admiring noises.

He grabbed another poster and added a lily pad, before presenting the entire thing to Agelada. “Here you are. Will you tell me what you know?” 

“I saw them,” Agelada said, taking the flower with reverent hands. “A man with a mask-- around his face to protect him from the air.”

“No filters, that’s good to know,” Bucky said. He, personally, had all sorts of nanotech blood and air filters in place, and Clint was a physical adept, so magically, had the same sort of protection. But this one, he wasn’t native to the underground, and he wasn’t protected against something like a neurostun grenade.

“He was carrying a man, like a bride. Bare feet, several anklets.” She pointed. “Teddy spoke to him, asked what he was doing. The guy dumped a credstick on him and kept on going.”

“Can someone ask Teddy -- I’ll pay him whatever cred is on that stick, I need it for identification.”

Voices murmured, people moved and some came closer. A little girl -- a troll, nearly as tall as Bucky already but probably only about eight or nine -- offered him a sheet of paper and Bucky folded it for her into a cute little kitten.

He folded flowers and cranes, gathered intel, and good will.

“You have a good heart, Winter Soldier,” the old ork shaman told him. “I see your sadness. Here.” She thudded on the ground a few times and conjured up a little spirit, tiny, barely visible in the darkness. It cast no shadow, it had no heat signature, more like a feeling in the air than anything else. “I am owed one last favor from this little one. He will take you where you want to go. You can rid our territory of this creature who thinks he is a man.”

“Well, I feel useless,” Clint said.

“Well, you are,” Bucky told him, and couldn’t help a grin when Clint smacked him in the shoulder. “Thank you for your assistance, we have to go now.”

“You are welcome here, Winter Soldier,” the shaman told him. “Go quickly. I sense you do not have much time.”


	3. Chapter 3

“Sir-- sir-- sir, wake up, sir--”

Tony shook his head from side to side. Everything he owned ached, and he had, he was pretty sure, actually passed out. “Five more minutes,” he mumbled, like the man who’d been beating him for the last ten hours was a pesky alarm clock and he could slap the snooze button.

It took Tony’s brain a few seconds to come back from Tahiti -- a magical place where nothing bad ever happened -- to realize that JARVIS was in his ear.

Tony didn’t say anything, he didn’t want to get Beck’s attention, and he didn’t open his eyes. Tried to pretend he was still unconscious, that it was sleep-mumbles. It was harder than it should have been. His ribs ached with every breath, his wrists were raw and bleeding, he was pretty sure that his shoulder was dislocated from straining at his bonds. Pretending to be limp with lack of awareness was like lifting a mountain.

“Sir, we’re almost to you, sir. Sergeant Barnes is carrying the suit and a high powered transmitter. Black Widow is on her way. They are within half a kilometer of your current location.”

Black Widow. His sister-in-law, and a street mage of no minor calibur. She would have healing spells, as well as brain-melting offensive abilities. Thank fragging God.

Tony let his eyes open a little, trying to spot Beck in the room. Half a kilometer, even for the suit flying under its own power, was anywhere between 30 seconds to 2 minutes. Longer if they had to try to punch through obstacles. Enough time for Beck to kill him, finally.

He stretched one hand out cautiously in the bindings. The nano-tech in his body that could call the suit pieces was keyed to gestures and a command word.

“Now,” Tony murmured, spreading his fingers in the command. One hand, that was all he needed.

“Are you awake, Mr. Stark?” Beck asked, crossing the room, a look of satisfied madness in his eyes. He knew who Tony was, knew that he specifically hated Tony. Beck was still convinced that he was Jack the Ripper, thought Tony was some particular detective who’d gotten too close, maybe. Who knew what delusions the malfunctioning chip in his brain was telling him. “So nice of you to join us again. I’m afraid you won’t be staying long. But I did want you to be awake, just for this last little bit.”

“What are you doing?” Tony didn’t even have to fake the fear in his voice. Distraction. All he needed was time. Please, just a little more time.

Beck held up a knife, monofilament edge glinting in the half-light. “I’m going to remove your liver. Everyone knows you drink too much, your greatest sin, Mr. Stark… and then, I think I might cut off your balls. I’ll arrange them nice and neat here for your cohorts to find. Where you can look at them while you bleed to death.”

“You’re sick, Beck,” Tony said. “You’re… you’re infected. Put the knife down, let us help you. You don’t want to do this, you’re not--”

“Oh, no, I really, really do want to do this,” Beck said. 

He pressed the knife against Tony’s belly, and even as exhausted and in pain as Tony was, he tried to flinch away from that touch.

Tony heard the whine of a repulsor. Oh, thank you JARVIS.

The glove formed around his hand and wrist, and Tony backhanded Beck as hard as he could. If he broke the man’s fragging neck, it would be too bad. 

“Come to daddy,” Tony said, and the rest of the pieces of the suit closed around him in a protective embrace. He staggered away from the bedframe, practically stumbling. He was too weak. “JARVIS, autopilot. Keep me up.”

“I have you, sir,” JARVIS said. “You’re safe now.”

“Get Beck,” Tony managed to say, and then he let go of control, let JARVIS hold him up, let JARVIS run the suit. JARVIS grabbed Beck’s wrist and held it away from his body, squeezing until the delicate bones in his wrist broke and he let go of the knife. Capturing Beck was as easy as falling. Which, as Tony slid quietly back into the blackness of unconsciousness, was pretty much exactly what JARVIS did. The suit weighed a little over 200 kilos. Beck wasn’t going _anywhere_.

* * *

“Wake up,” Natasha said to Tony, not quite slapping his face, but Bucky had to restrain himself from grabbing his sister’s hand.

“He’s had a bad day,” Bucky said.

“Yes, well, he’s wired from here to the harbor, and if he’s asleep, it’s even hard to heal him. He needs to wake up.”

Tony was cradled in the armor, and JARVIS had already activated the suit’s pharmaceutical suite, pain medication, blood filtering, detox. Much to Bucky’s surprise when they first met, Tony kept enough drugs in the suite to serve as an emergency Doc Wagon supplier, and had, in fact, deployed on difficult to reach Platinum contracts.

If nothing else, it often kept up the illusion that Iron Man and Tony Stark were not the same person.

On the other hand, Tony himself was not affected by trauma patches. Too much damage to his body over time, combined with his custom wire rigs, and he would just throw up and bleed harder.

It took a magic touch to keep him alive when someone stabbed him. Except that, again, because of all his wiring, his essence was, well, low.

Mages like Natasha would say that installing cyberware chipped away at a person’s essential humanity. Selling your soul to a corporate device. Harder to get a hold of, in the spiritual world. Tony wore a magical mask most of the time, to keep potential enemies from realizing his true cyber enhancements. Which he would have to drop in order for Natasha to heal him.

“Come on, baby, you’re still bleedin’,” Bucky said.

“Coffee?” Tony wondered.

“Soycaf,” Bucky returned, getting out the thermos.

“Traitor.”

“We were in a hurry.”

Tony made grabby hands at it anyway, which Bucky could have predicted and still found incredibly cute. There were many ways in which Tony was fully more capable than Bucky would ever be, but he acted like a child; he responded to the world with childlike wonder. And he was greedy as hell for coffee and sweets. And cheeseburgers. Which Bucky had also brought with them.

“Did we get Beck?”

“Yeah, Hawkeye’s taken him up for extraction,” Bucky said. “Let’s get you stable and then get the fragging hell out of here.”

“If you want stable from me, you’re going to be waiting a while, but not actively bleeding is achievable.”

“Asshole.”

“You love me.”

“I do,” Bucky said, brushing a lock of Tony’s hair off his forehead and tucking it back. “Which goes to show how stupid I am.”

“Very stupid,” Natasha agreed. “He is almost more trouble than he is worth.”

“I am insulted and hurt--”

“Yes, we know you are hurt,” Natasha said. “Sit back, breathe, and think pure thoughts.”

“If my getting better is dependent on my purity of thought, we’re fucked.”

“After,” Bucky promised.

“Ew, will you wait until I am not here anymore before you start your disgusting flirting?”

“No? Was this a trick question?” Bucky didn’t think that was particularly fair, since he had to live through Natasha and Hawkeye’s embarrassing courtship. 

Natasha closed her eyes, drawing on her understanding of the world and the forces within it. Her sort of magic, one part chemistry, one part philosophy, one part mathematics, and yet none of these things at a time, was a hermetic tradition. Different from what the shamans did, who called on the power of the old gods and ancient spirits. 

Bucky didn’t really understand any of it, which was good. He was even more cybered than his husband. Even if he’d had the aptitude for spellcasting, mana would not flow through him. 

Not that either he, or his sister, had a choice. Taken from their parents to pay a debt and trained to be corporate assassins by Hydra, they’d been leashed and locked for most of their young adulthood.

The problem with training someone to be lethal and giving people the slip, he and Natasha had done just that.

Escaped Hydra’s grasp.

Tony took a deep breath, and then another, and the lights flickered in the room. “Oh, that’s much better,” he said. “I could kiss you.”

“No, you cannot,” Natasha said. “But you are welcome. Let us go and collect our paycheck.”

She leaned heavily on Bucky’s arm as they left the hideaway underground. The sort of place Jack the Ripper would have liked. If Beck had, in fact, actually been Ripper.

He wasn’t; just a sadly deluded man with a bad chip in his head. It was even possible that when the chip was removed, he’d be sorry for what he’d done. Traumatized.

That wasn’t Bucky’s problem, however. 

* * *

“He’s meeting us _himself_ ,” Bucky hissed through clenched teeth.

Well, that changed things. “I cannot go to a meet with Justin fragging Hammer sitting at the table,” Tony hissed between clenched teeth. “The man _knows_ me.” Theoretically, at least. In as much as Justin Hammer -- CEO and Owner of Hammer Industries -- knew anyone. Or anything. He wasn’t an innovator so much as he was a venture capitalist gone mad with power. He bought tech, rebranded it, and called it his own.

Hammer Tech was one of Stark Industries biggest competitors here on the west coast. But their tech was faulty, prone to failing utterly, or working just right in the wrong situation. Tony’s corporate spies had even recorded Hammer trying to make his own version of the Iron Man suit.

The pilot of the first test model had his back broken in the first twenty seconds.

Tony wasn’t worried about Hammer’s tech being better than his, he was worried about it existing in the first place.

Case in point, the BTL chip.

“I need a decoy.” Tony muttered. “And a date.”

Bucky glowered and it was all Tony could do not to laugh; for reasons he didn’t yet understand, Bucky had thought he -- Tony Stark -- was a creature worth loving. Got jealous.

“It’s a mask, no more real than the one you wear over your face,” Tony said.

“You’re married and people know that,” Bucky pointed out. Because he was. Married to James Barnes. Not the Winter Soldier. Bucky was able to keep his mask on during meets, no one knew that he was, in fact, Tony Stark’s husband,

“Yes, that’s why I need a date,” Tony said, scrolling through his contacts list. “I’m not letting you go in there alone, and Tony Stark would never be seen in a place like this on official business. If I’m there with some common floozy, I can be around in case it goes to shit, and if it doesn’t, Hammer will think he has another piece of ammunition. I need Happy to come pilot the armor, Pepper darling, will you get him for me? And who do we trust?”

“Tony--” Pepper exclaimed, exasperated. “You can’t just go stealing my husband whenever you-- what do you need?” 

“I need someone who looks amazing in a dress, with the kind of reputation that would be seen with Tony Stark in a sleazy bar.”

“Do you need back up muscle?”

“Maybe?”

“I’ll send Jenn Walters to you,” Pepper said. “She’s big and green and amazingly pretty.”

“I think I’ve met her, the really hot troll chick?”

“Call her chick and she’ll break your face, so I advise against that line of approach.”

“Whatever. Get her in a dress and get her down here.”

“Happy’s already on his way to you,” Pepper reported. 

His fellow runners, relatives and otherwise, were all looking at him expectantly. “So, what’s the plan,” Natasha asked as soon as he dropped the call.

“I’m sending Happy in there with you to pretend to be Iron Man,” Tony said. “And then if this is all some big trap, I’m going to take a date here in about twenty minutes as myself.”

“You think Hammer’s going to try something at Penumbra?” Hawkeye was incredulous. “This is a treaty-enforced safe haven. Even he wouldn’t be so stupid.”

“It’s _Hammer_ ,” Tony pointed out, “and I’m pretty sure that stupid is his middle name.” He wouldn’t have even had to start something; getting eyes on Tony Stark as the infamous Iron Man would have been enough to start picking apart his life.

Tony had already done that once before, pulled up stakes and moved, because someone was determined to ruin him. Of course, Obie had been determined to ruin him with kidnapping and torture and coersion, but who was counting? Same, same.

And really, Hammer only had aspirations of being as much of a villain as Stane. 

Hammer was just stupid and petty and greedy.

Stane. Well, Stane was real evil, wasn’t he?

Happy was there, along with one of Tony’s backup fashionable suits -- the cloth and bulletproof weave sorts, with a nice shirt and tie, instead of the ones with microgrenade launchers and advanced targeting systems.

“Don’t worry, Happy,” Tony told him. “JARVIS will prompt you if you need it. Try not to talk too much, and look angry.”

“Boss, the suit has a mask,” Happy protested.

“Then it should be easy for you to look angry.” Tony took a deep breath. “Don’t let Justin ask too many questions. We did what he asked. Give him the chip--” Tony had made some modifications to it that should prevent anyone else from becoming unstable, and inserted a tracker-worm to keep tabs on Justin’s chip shop. 

Hopefully, he wasn’t stupid enough to try to mass produce them without some extensive re-tooling, especially after Beck was going to prison. Tony didn’t expect that particular circumstance to last for long and he already had plans underway to take Hammer industries down. But those were going to involve outside shadowrunning teams, so it couldn’t possibly be traced back to Stark Industries.

“Easier just to nuke the site from orbit,” Bucky muttered. “It’s the only way to be sure.”

“Down boy,” Tony said. “Stop showing your feral side in front of the Johnson.” Tony gave him a kiss. “Go in there and do me proud.”

“Always,” Bucky said, drawing Tony back in for a deeper kiss before strapping on his face mask and putting on his resting bitch face.

“We will be fine,” Natasha told him. “You worry too much.”

“And you don’t worry enough,” Tony retorted. It was an old line.

But he’d be there, if things went very badly. And he already had backup plans in place, in case it did.


	4. Chapter 4

Justin Hammer was a modern-day fop. The sort of man who, back in medieval times, would have hovered around the king, just on the close side of too annoying to be borne, and just useful enough to be worth tolerating. Who had a powerful family and it wasn’t worth getting into the fight to have him fed to the dogs as he should be. Also, probably not very nice to the dogs, but Bucky knew a wyvern or two with a cast-iron stomach that could probably digest that drek.

His clothes were expensive and well-tailored and just not quite… right. He didn’t have Tony’s casual elegance or even a good stylist. He obviously either picked the wrong people, or he didn’t trust his people. Because that tie didn’t… quite clash with the shirt, but it was so close that Bucky kept staring at it, wanting to shade it in, or rip it off. He wasn’t sure, but to his cyber eyes, it was painfully ugly.

“ _Stop scowling_ ,” Natasha said, her Russian low-pitched, carrying to Bucky’s augmented ears. “ _You will spoil your dinner._ ”

Bucky shoved the plate of real beef and farm grown vegetables in his sister’s direction. He wasn’t hungry. He sure wasn’t hungry for the drek that Hammer had ordered for them, preferences unasked for. 

It was real food, but Hammer as off brand soy as they came.

And worst of all, the man kept trying to imitate Tony Stark. 

Maybe, if Bucky hadn’t known Tony as well as he did, he wouldn’t have noticed that Hammer’s idiosyncrasies were forced, a pale imitation of a great man. 

No, Bucky decided, watching Hammer pontificate. He would have known something was wrong. It was all just a little too ersatz.

Hammer was an asshole, but it didn’t seem to bother his sister any. Hammer was still paying them, after all, and he wasn’t trying to stiff them on the check.

It was not, however, a particularly generous payout, and he was stiffing them on the bonus.

Happy Hogan, who sometimes served as Tony’s bodyguard, was sitting in the Iron Man armor, stiff and unnatural. Tony wore the suit like a model wore her catwalk dresses, all swagger and ease. Happy looked like someone shoved a pole up his backside. 

People might notice if Bucky treated Happy like Happy, though. It was rumored that the Winter Soldier and Iron Man were lovers. So Bucky leaned toward the suit of armor and tried to pretend it was Tony in there.

 _“You’re not selling it,”_ Natasha said. _“Lean back and put your feet in his lap or something.”_

Bucky did that instead, and JARVIS was probably prompting Happy, since the Iron Man mask tilted in Bucky’s direction. Aww. Picture perfect.

And, in fact, it was.

Picture. 

Bucky sighed, spotting the holoreporter. Christine something or other, she was a sometimes-fashion reporter who wanted to break big news, so she kept snooping around, trying to find a scoop.

And she did not have a lot of respect for Shadowrunners. One of those who’d be happy to out someone. Good thing Tony was coming in as Tony. Keep the Tony as Iron Man rumors down to back channel bullshit. Tony had, in fact, spread some of those rumors himself, as a way to misdirect. 

Sometimes Bucky wondered why they didn’t just retire. It wasn’t like they needed the nuyen.

But he already knew the answer to that. Because they didn’t need the money, they could afford to take risks and jobs that no one else could. They could help people who needed help, not corps who needed a scapegoat or someone else to blame.

They did it because they could help. And that was enough for Bucky. And Tony had something, some drive deep down inside, a need to prove himself as something other than yet another Sinner.

Hammer was still talking, but it wasn’t like Bucky had been paying attention anyway. It didn’t matter. Bucky had figured it out; Hammer wanted the street cred for hanging out with a shadowrun team. He’d probably had someone drop a tip to Christine. So, every moment here was wasted, just fodder for Hammer’s reputation. Bucky wondered if he could get away with dumping a drink in Hammer’s lap.

And then Tony came in, all full of razzle-dazzle. He had a small coterie of fashionable pretty people with him, and was being checked out by at least a dozen more.

All the attention in the bar, which had been on Hammer, abruptly shifted.

Because even trash knew what class was.

Except, apparently, Justin Hammer.

“Tony-- hey, Tony, come ‘ere.” Hammer waved one arm, and then both when Tony seemed like he was going to be able to ignore Hammer entirely. “Look, it’s my good friend, Tony Stark. Hey, Tony, mind if I call you Tony--”

“Yes,” Tony said, one eyebrow quirking. “Who are you again?”

“He’s a kidder, that’s what he does, he kids,” Hammer said. “I was just here with my shadowrun team-- you know these guys, right, really famous--”

“Can’t say that I’ve ever had a need to get personally involved with covert operations,” Tony said, turning toward the bar. “If you’ll--”

Hammer started snapping his fingers wildly. “A drink, a drink for Tony Stark, here, yes, why weren’t you already--”

Somewhat bemused, Bucky watched as Tony found himself swept up into the annoying enthusiasm that was Justin Hammer. And then sat next to Natasha, with a “she’s just your type,” which got an entire collector’s set of eyebrows, all raised.

“She’s pretty enough,” Tony said, treading very carefully on the line between being his playboy persona, and pissing off his husband.

“But not handsome enough to tempt you, Mister Stark?” Natasha asked, laying it on thick, and also, practically draping herself across Tony’s lap. Because it would distract Hammer, annoy her husband, and piss off her brother. Natasha never did a thing for one reason when she could do it for three or four different ones.

“I make it a point to only do six impossible things before breakfast,” Tony said. Bucky had to hide a smug smile as he knew exactly what sort of impossible things his husband liked to do before breakfast. In fact, Bucky was looking forward to doing some of them, later. “It’s late.”

“So you should invite her on a breakfast date,” Justin suggested.

“I’m good, thanks,” Tony said. “I came in to party, not settle down.” He took the drink that Hammer bought him and snapped it back like it was medicine. The look on Tony’s face when he finished the drink, Bucky wondered if Hammer had tampered with it, or-- oh, probably just not shelled out enough nuyen. Tony had discriminating taste for booze. And coffee.

No soycaf for him, it had to be the real bean. Unless he was in character as a shadowrunner.

Huh. Bucky wondered if _Tony Stark_ was as much a character choice as Iron Man was. And, of course, the corollary. Did Bucky, in fact, know the real Tony at all, or was everything just a series of masks?

“Oh, oh, Miss Everhart!” Hammer said, snapping his fingers again. Christine Everhart came over, with a willing smile that nonetheless had an edge to it. Justin Hammer would pay for treating her like a common flunkie. “I don’t know if you’ve met Christine, but she’s doing a piece--”

“Yes, we’ve met,” Tony said, eyeing her. “She did quite the spread on me, a few years back. And also, wrote an article.”

Bucky’s eyes narrowed. Not that he didn’t know Tony had this reputation before, but Bucky didn’t like being reminded of it. He didn’t like being within choking distance of someone who’d once laid hands on Tony’s skin, who--

“Yes, well, as I was telling her earlier,” Hammer continued, ignoring all social cues and the growing tension at the table.

“Excuse us a moment,” Christine said. “Mr. Stark, may I speak with you a moment, please?” The way she said it, biting down on all her words, made Bucky think it wasn’t a request. 

Hammer continued to babble on for a few minutes, without seeming to realize that everyone interesting at the table had left, and that he was, in fact, boring his group of Shadowrunners, who would like to get paid and leave.

Bucky tuned him out. Literally. He focused his select sound dampner, cancelling the general club racket, Justin Hammer’s annoying voice, his sister-- and shifted just a little toward Tony.

Listening to that particular conversation.

Not because he thought Tony was setting up a secret meeting for sex -- even the stupidest, most unfaithful asshole would not be that dumb -- but because there was a reason Christine was here, there was a reason Hammer had been here, and Bucky would be a troll’s uncle if he thought either of those reasons were the other.

“-- can’t believe I was such a fool to believe you,” Christine said. “To think you had me going there, Stark, when you’re just up to your old drek. You’re a liar, and a warmonger. You know this--”

She flipped a screen at him, and Tony’s eyes narrowed before he gave her a broad, insincere smile.

“This isn’t my concern.” Whatever this was, it was Tony’s concern. “What Stane does is his business.”

“It’s still your name on the side of the building,” Christine pointed out. “Are you saying you really didn’t _know_?”

“What happens in New York is the UCAS’s problem. As you might have noticed, I no longer live there.”

“Uh-huh,” Christine said. “I’m sure that’s a comfort to those people who are currently under a police state, run by _your_ Iron Legions.”

“They’re not mine.”

“Can I quote you on that?”

“Of course you can, darling, I’m saying it, aren’t I?”

Bucky took a deep breath and refocused his hearing. Hammer was still rambling. “Slot it and run, chummer,” he said, shoving his credstick in Hammer’s direction. “We have another contract, just came up. Very lucrative.”

Hammer was a lot of things, including incredibly stupid, but most people did not face six feet of Russian Razerboi without flinching. He took out his cred stick and paid off his runners.

“ _Where are we going?_ ”

“New job,” Bucky lied. “I will give you details on the way.” He took Iron Man’s hand, because that was only to be expected. Happy hesitated before closing the fingers around Bucky’s wrist, but it probably wouldn’t be noticed. The sooner Bucky could get the team out of there, the sooner Tony could leave. He wouldn’t want to make a scene and he had to be there longer. To throw off suspicion, and perhaps to get more information from Christine.

Bucky wondered if an old rival of his would be willing to do some work; create a distraction enough to get Christine Everhart off the scene for long enough that Tony could take care of whatever she’d brought to his attention. Bucky tapped his phone in his pocket and plugged himself in. 

He dumped some contact information into the Matrix. If Crossbones was out there, a call from his old buddy, the Asset, would garner some attention.

* * *

The worst thing about Christine Everhart -- aside from that Tony had once slept with her and she resented the fact that he didn’t wish to again -- was that she was almost always… not quite right. She usually had the basic facts right; Stark Industry weapons had been used to demolish a small, First Nations tribe on the border of near Vancouver territory, hundreds put to death as a so-called weapons test, that was really Stark Weapons sold under the table to white supremacist groups.

Christine had believed Tony was aware of it and turning a blind eye. Or he had been so busy being a drunkard and attempting to get into every pretty person’s pants in the nearby vicinity that he’d rotted his brain enough not to notice.

She assumed malice and incompetence instead of what it had truly been. Betrayal. Putting his trust in the wrong person. Obie had raised him, more than his parents ever did. Howard Stark, unmistakably, incomprehensibly threatened by his own son had abused and berated him. Maria, who’d turned to BTLs and other drugs to ease the pain of the life she’d chosen willingly, who was fond of Tony, yes, but in a vague, unhelpful sort of way.

Obie had been the one to comfort and console. The one to encourage and listen.

Christine couldn’t even imagine the frightened, lost, lonely boy that Tony had been. Like everyone in his life up until that point, she’d believed that money could solve every problem, and that Tony could never be so honestly grateful for the few scraps of attention Obie had been willing to throw his way, that he’d trusted Obie like his own left hand. Thought Obie incapable.

Well, who was Tony to correct her?

No one.

So, Tony had taken her story and her facts and gone searching for the answers.

By the time he found them, when he did confront Stane, it had been well and away too late.

He’d lost the company. He’d lost any sense of integrity, and he’d damn near lost his own life.

Tony tapped on the arc-reactor in his chest. 

A very narrow escape.

And like a frightened child, he fled. He needed to rebuild his resources. He went west, to Seattle. Rebuilt his company from scratch. Better than his father’s company. Smarter. Not a weapons company, but a protection agency. Legion police could get in where even Lone Star was afraid to go, protect the people without risk, without prejudice.

“You know that Stane’s using your police force to repress the freedoms of First Nations and Elven people everywhere?”

“This isn’t my concern.” Whatever this was, it was Tony’s concern. “What Stane does is his business.”

The Board, the police, the military, all had seen to that. They weren’t interested in Tony’s ideas for green energy, for pollution clean up, for new air filters and water filters. They weren’t interested in taking responsibility for their shit, they were interested in the bigger, badder guns, and Obie was giving it to them.

He went through the rest of the conversation on autopilot, not quite sure what he was saying.

_This is your fault._

_You only fight for yourself._

_Stark has given the world the biggest sword it has ever seen and yet tries to tell us that it’s a shield, meant to protect us._

Voices, accusations. Guilt.

Despair.

These were all things that had driven him to run, had forced him to build Stark West. That had driven him to drink and nearly to ruin before he hit upon the idea.

Iron Man.

Someone who could do the things that he couldn’t.

It had changed his life, becoming a Shadowrunner. Getting into and destroying the corporations who could only see the next quarter’s profit and not the cost in lives and blood.

He knew the playboy routine so well he could do it in his sleep -- and in fact, sometimes had. He danced, he drank, he partied. He watched his Shadowrun team ditch Justin Hammer and get off the grid. That was smart, that was safe. Tony only ever ended up hurting the people he cared about.

Maudlin, depressed, but also determined.

Tony knew what he had to do, even if he didn’t want to do it. Go back to New York. Stop Obie. This time, for good. The really tricky bit would be getting out of Seattle before his husband and the rest of their team knew what he was doing.

Bucky wouldn’t want to let Tony go alone, but this was Tony’s responsibility.

Not to mention, the team was SINless. They couldn’t even set foot in New York without setting off every possible alarm. They’d have no contacts, no friends. They’d be cut off and alone and in danger because Tony set them there.

He wouldn’t do it.

He’d figure this shit out. He was a goddamn genius, wasn’t he?


	5. Chapter 5

There was nothing like making a clean getaway.

“This is nothing like making a clean getaway,” Tony muttered.

“No,” said Captain America, who’d been apparently designated spokesperson for the group. Tony recognized the way Bucky often deferred to the Captain in matters of tactics -- and when Bucky was really angry. So, probably Tony was in for some deep dreck, as soon as the actual group discussion was over. “No, it’s not.”

Tony leaned against the pillar. The group worked together so regularly that Tony had employed a number of safe houses for them across the city, places to meet up, or crash out. Shadowrunners had to keep an eye out, all the time, to make sure they didn’t meet an untimely demise at the hands of a corp-exec who had recently been burned. Make an example of them.

So Tony had selected one of the better equipped but less used ones, told Bucky there was a vendor meeting at Stark Reliant and slipped away.

Obviously, he hadn’t fooled _anyone_.

“JARVIS are you telling tales on me out of school?”

“Would I do that, sir?”

Tony sighed. “Look, this isn’t a job, or a group decision.”

“We see that you made a decision, but as it’s a stupid-ass decision, we’re electing to ignore it,” Bucky said.

“You should listen to your husband,” Black Widow said. She was sitting on his sofa, drinking his hooch, and wearing, he might add, armor that he’d made for her, and lecturing him about who he should listen to.

“This is not-- there’s no money in this, it’s personal,” Tony tried again. He’d rather convince them to let him go, rather than have to draw the big guns. (Metaphorically speaking. Tony was pretty sure he could not, in fact, outgun any of them, if it was more than two to one.)

“And we are not people? Stop being racist.” That was Hawkeye. “Look, Tony, over the years, you’ve helped us with our personal stuff. There’s no way we’d be as good as we are, without you. So, if you’re planning on going off to New York Megaplex to commit suicide, save us the trouble and let Natasha slit your throat right here. Otherwise, bite me, Billionaire. We’re going with you. If nothing else, we’re protecting our investment.”

“You really don’t know what you’re in for,” Tony said, because sometimes actual reasons might work. “The city is huge, like multiple archologies at once, and the security is like nothing you’ve ever dealt with before. I can get in. But existing in the shadows? That doesn’t happen much in the city. You need a SIN, and none of you have them, aside from Bucky.”

“James Stark,” Bucky said, “has a SIN. Bucky Barnes does not.”

“Well, that, too.”

“So get them for us,” Steve said, like this was only reasonable. 

“And there are shadows in New York, just like everywhere else,” Natasha said. “I have some old Red Room contacts. We will be able to make it work, Tony. But not if we are not with you. And it is much easier to go with you, than to sneak along behind and try to hide from you and your enemies at the same time. Which we will do, and you cannot stop us. Give in while you still have your dignity intact.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t worry about that part,” Bucky said. “You’re not getting off so easily. I can’t believe you tried to sneak away _without me_. Are you-- do you not trust us?”

“It’s not that,” Tony said. “I’m telling you, this is a problem of my own making, and I don’t want to put your lives at risk-- not when I could--”

“Get yourself killed and not have to worry about it,” Hawkeye said. “Button up, Stark. We’re going. You can either help, or you can continue to flail about, but you’re not getting out of this. We’re a team.”

“You’re a team that could use a lesson in manners, and I hope you’ve got some fragging good ideas on how to get you into the city, and then, more importantly, back out.”

“We have a plan,” Bucky said, reassuringly.

“We have about twelve percent of a plan,” his sister corrected.

“Oh, huzzah,” Tony said, sarcastically as he knew how, and the sarcasm was a cover for his fear. He had to do this, he had to. But he’d hoped to be able to use his contacts and money to hire local, once he got to the metroplex. These guys, his team -- his family -- didn’t know what they were getting into, no matter how big they talked. “Well, let’s see your plan.”

* * *

**Posted by u/control/horiz [account terminated] - 1 year ago**

Even orcs got mamas. Mine’s ill. Looking to make a dash into NYCM and see her before she goes to breeder heaven. Advice?

**QueuedUp [account terminated] - 11 months ago**

Don’t go. But if you have to, chummer, go orc underground all the way.

**Dazzler [account terminated] - 11 months ago**

Kiss your mama goodbye. Try 2 Contact the Cyclops. Tell him you’re looking for a chummer named Rocket. 

**u/control/horiz [account terminated] - 11 months ago**

Rumor telling of access to 20th century orc tunnels

**BigBadWolf - 10 months ago**

You don’t talk about that. That’s a good way to get terminated. And not just your account.

**u/control/horiz [account terminated] - 10 months ago**

Thanks, Rocket, if you’re reading this chummer. Love my mama.

* * *

“You want to follow a year old lead to possible orcish underground in New York City, the largest collection of SINners in the world?”

“It’s a good lead,” Bucky said. “And there’s always orcs and dwarves. Human purges didn’t kill them all, and they’re really good at hiding.”

“We’re humans,” Tony protested. “We’ll never find them.”

“Speak for yourself, pinkie,” Clint said. “Besides, I brought a friend.”

“You have friends?”

“Hulk friend,” Hulk said, pushing into the room. He was huge, dark green, with hair the color of shiny tar. He wore almost no clothes, and had a Matrix board slung over his back. He acted dumb, Tony knew, but Hulk was smarter than he had any right to be.

“You are not going,” Tony declared, throwing his hands up. “Who’s idea was this, Brucie, you are not anything close to inconspicuous.”

“You see.” Hulk held up a syringe about the size of something Tony might have considered stabbing an elephant with and jabbed himself in the neck, then grabbed his pants as they started sliding off hips that were getting rapidly more narrow. 

“ _Bruce_?”

“It’s not permanent,” Bruce said, hanging onto his pants with both hands. “And if my heart rate goes over a hundred and forty beats a minute, I’ll burn through it even faster. But it will get me by quite a number of difficulties.”

“What’s in this for you?”

“I have an associate in NYCM, a man I know only as Mr. Blue,” Bruce said, nodding at Widow when she handed him a belt. “We’ve been doing research over the Matrix, but he’s developed an interesting formula. Won’t share it over the ‘net. Wants me to come in person. Since I need to go anyway--”

“Sounds like a trap,” Bucky pointed out.

“I always think everything’s a trap,” Bruce said. “It’s why I’m still alive.”

“Ha ha,” Tony said. “All right, so we can all blend in, sort of. Hawkeye still sticks out like a pointy-ear.”

“No one sees me that I don’t want to see me. I could disappear right in front of you, chummer,” Hawkeye said.

“While Hawkeye is working on being the invisible man,” Tony said, “have we made contacts with the orcish underground.”

“I know where to find this Cyclops guy,” Bucky said. “Best plan is going to be to use our resources, baby doll.”

“You mean I’m paying for it?”

“I’m thinking a high speed, low profile dropship from one of the orbitals. We can get close enough to the city and go in cloaked. We’ll be in the sky less than two minutes, and we’re not likely to get hit on radar.”

“And I’ll be on top of the NYC Matrix if we are. Slight malfunction, nothing to worry about,” Bruce said.

“Land here-- just east of the city, in the ocean. We’ll pack submersibles and make a water entrance here. According to my contact, a group a of orcs and trolls have a safe place here, under the Statue of Liberty.”

“How very symbolic of them.”

“We’ll have to make a deal right there on the spot. Their leader, Star Lord, he’s supposed to be… very dangerous. And he doesn’t do deals unless he can look you in the eye. But if we can strike a deal with him, we can get into the orc underground, and there are tunnels all over the city. We can do this, Tony.”

“What’s going to happen,” Tony said morosely, “is that we’re all going to die and it’s going to be my fault.”

“Well, at least you’ll be dead along with us?”

Unfortunately, that was, Tony feared, exactly the problem. He’d always managed to come out ahead of the many troubles that life had thrown him. So many troubles. And here he was, one of the richest men in the world (again) with a perfectly wonderful family. He was risking _everything_.

“Right,” Tony said. “Together, then.”

* * *

Bucky couldn’t get enough of the view. They’d hit the elevator -- what Stark Reliant called the shuttle that went straight up to the Orbital Station -- about a day ago.

In order to pinpoint the drop perfectly, they had to remain in orbit for almost three days, so that the station could change trajectory slightly and not raise suspicion, and then for the world to turn under them. 

“It’s a precision hit,” Harley Keener said, tapping his stylus at the hard light display. “Assuming that the Mechanic cuts the power to this, this, and this sensor exactly at the right time, for no more than ten seconds -- which, he’s the Mechanic, I don’t think he can screw up something this basic --”

“Your faith in me is astounding,” Tony said, giving the young man a sly look.

“Yeah, well, we’re connected,” Keener said, and then they both laughed. Personal joke, Bucky guessed. He had enough of those.

“Then we’ll drop you off practically on Satan’s front stoop. It’s up to you from there.”

Even for the entire conversation -- and Bucky knew it was important, even though none of it really had anything to do with him, he wasn’t a pilot or a navigator. He was useless, right up until they hit the ground -- Bucky hadn’t been able to stop looking through the port windows.

They weren’t really windows, not there on Command, they were just screens.

But here, in the lounge, there were, in fact, actual windows.

“Never gets old, does it,” Tony said, coming up beside him. “Seeing how tiny and perfect the planet looks from here.”

“Maybe when we’re all done an’ ready to retire, we can do it on the Luna base?”

“Yeah, you want to live in space, honey?”

“It’s so peaceful up here,” Bucky said.

“That’s always a good thing,” Tony replied. “When it gets loud and crazy in space, you know you’re in trouble. But I can put in for a dome if you want to live in space. They’re adding new wings onto the Luna base all the time. It’s a lot cheaper to launch exploratory probes from the moon than it is to launch them from earth.”

“You’ll be in demand,” Bucky said. “And I can be your house husband. Take care of your kids and get your prepackaged meals reconstituted for you when you come home. Not much different from now, except no one’s shooting at me.”

“You set such a low bar for a happy life,” Tony said. He leaned against Bucky, looking out the window.

“I have you,” Bucky said. “What more do I really need?”

And his gaze was drawn back to the blue marble of a world, turning slowly under them. From this distance, Bucky could practically hold the planet in his hand. Even horrible pollution centers showed up as smudges of slightly darker clouds blocking the blue and brown. It was peaceful. Small.

“Do you think we’re alone,” Tony wondered, looking out at the stars. 

“If there is no other life among all the billions of worlds available,” Bucky said, “seems like a terrible waste of space.”

“Well, that, too,” Tony said, “but I was thinking more about trying some low-gee activities. I’ve always heard about them, never tried it.”

“You want to join the three-fifty club?” The station was at or about three hundred and fifty kilometers from the earth’s surface.

“It’s a very exclusive membership,” Tony teased. “More people have made it on the moon than have managed to screw in a space station.”

“Is there a list?”

“On the Matrix, there’s a list of everything,” Tony promised.

“Well, then let’s get on it.”


	6. Chapter 6

“Redirecting security monitor D7 through D21 and E9 through E18, sir,” JARVIS said, activating the pre-flight commands. The monitors in the satellite security net that covered most of the UCAS were critical to keeping people from doing exactly what Tony was going, although most people who dropped things from satellites were dropping bombs. Mass bombs were efficient and deadly. For the most part, anything dropped from space always hit the ground, and the blast radius was incredible.

Tony had done any number of stupid things with the Iron Man suit on -- including testing flight capabilities for the first time by trying to reach the stratosphere, icing over the entire suit, and nearly plummeting to his death.

JARVIS liked to remind him of that, from time to time, when he thought Tony was exceeding safety protocols and generally being a real drekhead.

Funny, Tony though, looking at the faces of his team as they sped toward the planet in a drop-rocket, JARVIS was utterly silent now.

This was, he decided, the dumbest thing he’d ever done. The drop rocket was really nothing more than a tin can with one very limited fuel canister on it, let go by the station that they could no longer reach even if things went horrifically wrong.

Bruce, who still had his human skin on, polished glasses he didn’t need in his other form. “Statistically, space flight is much safer than driving. Or even taking the metro. Just, all space travel accidents result in fatalities. You could just lose an arm, taking the train.”

“Oh, that’s so reassuring.”

“I’m glad you know how to drive this thing, Stark,” Black Widow said from the back. He’d seen her face down an insane troll who was carrying a Vindicator mini-gun in each hand without so much as batting an eyelash, but she was pale and clinging to Hawkeye’s hand.

Which meant, of course, that Tony had to immediately change his demeanor -- not that they could see him, piloting and with the suit-on. “Not a problem, Itsy-bitsy,” he said. “I practically invented space to earth travel.”

“And here I thought all you invented was a fancy pair of sunglasses and blowjobs,” Bucky teased.

“The captain has turned on the No Sharing sign, Buck,” Captain America said. 

The banter through the small rocket soothed all of them, and Tony wondered if Black Widow had been scared at all, or if she’d put up a front to raise the morale of her entire team. Tony had to hand it to her, she was a master at manipulation. Enough so that he’d pulled her out of magework from time to time to serve as his personal assistant at Stark Resilient, scoping out other business rivals.

Very flexible, the Black Widow, and Tony didn’t just mean her bendy spine. A talent she shared with her brother, even if Bucky wasn’t prone to using his charm to get his way.

Well, with anyone but Tony.

“Landing’s gonna be rough,” Tony told them, even though they all knew it already. “Check your straps, we’re coming in shortly.”

A drop rocket was exactly what it sounded like. A rocket, dropped from space. JARVIS had cleared a path for them so they would neither be shot down and rained all over the Hudson River Valley, nor intercepted by UCAS security teams as soon as they reached the water.

“Thrusters in 3, in 2… thrusters.” Tony gave the fuel a nudge. Anyone from the ground would hopefully not be looking long -- they’d selected their time of day drop for dawn, where a flare of light could be mistaken for reflected sunlight, or someone waking up.

They might still run into people; the dropship had a stealth coating, no one should see anything more than a blur of air, and Widow had thrown some sort of magical shielding over it as well, but if Tony had learned anything in his life, it was that things never went smooth. 

“Security net camera back on line, issued a command to maintenance to check for routine hiccups in the system. We are undetected, sir.”

“Thank you, as always, J.”

The rocket hit the water, and slipped under it, barely making a ripple.

“We have successfully crashed into the harbor,” Tony announced. “In one piece.”

“Never doubted you for a second,” Hawkeye scoffed.

“Yes, Clint, you did,” Black Widow told him. “Several seconds on the trip down and not less than fifteen minutes on the way up.”

“He doubted me,” Tony gasped, pretending to be hurt.

“Don’t let it go to your head,” Captain America said, clapping him on the shoulder as he unbuckled. “Clint doubts everyone.”

“Except Nat,” Hawkeye protested. 

“Alright, stow the chatter and let’s get these submersibles out,” the good Captain directed. He was in charge as soon as they hit the ground by virtue of being better at it. Also, bigger and stronger than most of the rest of the group. Some time, Tony would like to arrange some sort of sparring match between Cap and Bucky, just to see who was, in the end, stronger.

But not today. Today they had a city invasion to execute.

Let the fun begin.

* * *

Bucky kept an eye on Tony as they made their way from the crash site -- Tony would have gotten pissed if Bucky called it that out loud, but since the entry vehicle was never leaving its watery grave, “crash site was” appropriate.

He’d never known what happened to Tony, Tony never said, that made him so phobic about water, but he didn’t like water in his face, didn’t like to be under water.

Bucky could tell, the way Tony’s hands clenched and the way he carefully didn’t look at anyone; it wasn’t something he’d gotten over, but he was determined not to let it show. Not let the team see a moment of weakness.

Ruining that facade for Tony would be unforgivable. 

So Bucky just watched. Kept a hand light on Tony’s back when it looked like he needed extra support. 

“Your submersible looks beat up,” Bucky murmured. “Want to share mine?”

Tony gave him a quick, almost unfathomable, glance, then nodded. “Best not to take chances. I’ll ride with the Soldier,” he said over comms. “My submersible didn’t take the landing well.” And only Bucky saw him pocket a connection wire.

Everyone got their rebreathers connected, Tony slid onto the back of Bucky’s submersible, and locked his arms around Bucky’s waist. Bucky patted his hands, making sure they were nice and tight. _I got you, babe._

The bay was black as the inside of Bucky’s boot; he had to watch the scanners rather than see what was in front of him. Not many fish, but some. But lots of downed ships and airplanes, from some of the last wars. Trash and debris of all sorts.

They went slower than any of them would have liked, seeking the underwater entrance, and then, finally, Hawkeye signaled that he had it, and they followed the elven archer to a patch of blackness, dark even in the darkness. Like a hole.

Bucky shuddered, felt Tony’s response, but they had no choice, really. Not anymore. Stick to the plan.

Not far from that hole, however, was land. Underground, dark and wet and sticky, but there was air to breathe and a tunnel that led into what might be the old subway system.

“Water and caves,” Tony swore. “Could it get worse?”

“You want to tell me about it?” Bucky kept his voice down. Steve would be able to hear them, if he was concentrating, but probably no one else.

“Before we met,” Tony said, shaking his head and fluffing his hair out a little. “Before… before any of this. Shadowrunning or the Iron Man suit. I got kidnapped.” His fingers danced a jig against the arc-reactor in his chest. “I took shrapnel, this kept me alive. Much as I would rather not have-- they wanted me to build for them. Forcible hiring, you might say. I refused, and the refusal was not accepted well.”

Bucky nodded. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. They kept me in a sub basement. Waterboarded me. I wouldn’t give in. Eventually, I built the prototype suit, right under their noses. Got most of the way out. Rhodey got me the rest of the way.”

“Yikes,” Bucky said, very gently. “I won’t let that happen again.”

Tony shot him a quick look, half doubt, half gratitude. “I know-- I thought I was better, and then that shit with Beck happened. I don’t…”

“Yeah,” Bucky said. “I knew that shit was a bad plan. I’ll always come for you, though. You know that, right?”

“I know.” 

They didn’t have time to deal with Tony’s issues, but Bucky snarled when Steve tried to move them along. “I’m here,” he told Tony again. “Nothin’ will ever keep me from you.”

“I know.” In the darkness, Tony took his hand, and when they moved forward into the tunnels, Tony’s grip grew stronger, almost painfully tight. Bucky didn’t complain. He kept his hand in his husbands. “You came, when I needed you. I know. I’m all right.”

He wasn’t, but Bucky could let him pretend. And they’d be back in the light soon enough. Tony had a legit SIN, and he’d gotten Bucky one, too. James Stark was a real person. Bucky shook his head. He hadn’t been James in decades. But for Tony, he could pretend to be a real person. One of the SINners.

Nat would hold up a hand from time to time, and they’d stop while she flitted ahead in her astral form. It was draining, and she wouldn’t be able to keep it up for long without rest, but it was probably safer than fighting.

“There are restless spirits here,” she reported, the second time she came back, panting for breath and sweat beading on her forehead. “One of them challenged me. They’re not bound, but very close to the people who live here.”

“Aside from that, Mrs. Lincoln,” Hawkeye wondered, “how was the play?”

“There’s a group of meta-humans, about a half mile in, in a small cavern. One of them saw me, but I don’t think they’re hostile. We might be able to bargain with them for a place to stay and introductions to people who can help.”

“Great. Half a mile,” Tony said. “No big deal.”

“What have we got? Trolls?” Hawkeye asked. He wasn’t always big on some of the other meta-humans. Almost as biased as a human. Elves. Bucky snorted.

“I don’t know exactly. Mutants, mostly,” Nat said. “One is a familiar spirit of a tree; his shaman is the one who saw me.”

“You think this tree spirit--”

“Groot.”

“You think this _Groot_ will help us?”

“He’s not hostile,” Nat said. “We can ask. That’s really all we can do. I don’t want to fight the whole orcish underground.”

“Orcs and trolls,” Bruce rumbled. “We can bargain.”

“There’s not even supposed to be an orcish underground,” Tony started to say. “New York--”

“Can’t kill a roach,” a new voice said. “What makes you think they can kill us? Who are you people, anyway?”

Bucky reached for his gun; he hadn’t even heard them. Either their shaman was that good, or he hadn’t been paying attention.

“Uh. uh uh uh, do it and I’ll turn the elf’s head to mush. All you’ll have left is a pretty pair of ears.”

The repulsors powered up. “You melt my guy, I’ll fry yours,” Tony said. “Who do you work for?”

“Who do I work for? What do you expect me to say, Aztech? I work for myself, asshole.”

“Right,” Nat said, holding up her hands gingerly. “We didn’t come to get in a fight. Is Groot with you?”

“How do you think we followed you, lady?”

That was spoken by a knee-high little dwarf off-shoot, maybe. He looked like a cybered-up racoon, honestly. Bucky had never seen anything like him.

“Hi,” Bucky said. “We’re just looking for a little help here.”

“Nice gun,” the racoon said. “How much?”

“Not for sale.”

“What about the arm? There’s a lot of parts there,” the racoon countered.

“You need a mechanic?” Tony asked, tentatively.

“ _I’m_ a mechanic,” the racoon said. “What I need are _parts_. There’s a shortage around here.”

“We have parts,” Tony offered. “A couple of submersibles, among a few other things. Maybe we can come to some sort of deal?”

“I am Groot,” the tree said, putting one branchy hand on the racoon’s shoulder.

“Yeah, yeah,” the racoon said. “I’m Rocket, this here’s Quill-- come on, bring the submersibles.”

“I can’t carry it,” Tony protested. 

“I can,” the biggest damn dwarf that Bucky had ever seen said. 

“This is Drax,” Rocket said. “He can carry anything except a tune.”

“Riiiight.”


	7. Chapter 7

The home cavern was, in fact, the remains of a couple of subway cars. The insides had been ripped out and repurposed and the whole thing was warm and snug. If you liked ancient underground hideaways.

Tony did not, he’d never been one for spelunking or even basement raves even before Afghanistan, but now. It was as if he could feel the weight above his head that would crush him. And probably not instantly, but slowly, like drowning.

Bucky squeezed Tony’s hand, and it was a comfort, but not much. There wasn’t much even a super soldier could do against a million tons of earth and steel. Physics was just one of those things that was hard to fight.

He hitched in a breath and attempted to concentrate.

The group they’d found -- orcs and dwarves and rare off-breeds of elf -- were one of those jumble of races, thrown together because they weren’t accepted anywhere else. Not that his own group wasn’t composed of a variety of outcasts and renegades. Maybe they could find something else in common.

“What is it you want here anyway?” their leader -- or at least their spokesperson -- demanded. “The ol’ Rotten Apple isn’t much for people who don’t belong here. And quite frankly, I can’t think of a single place where a group like you guys… belong.”

“Neither can we,” Black Widow said, looking at Quill coolly. 

“As it happens, we need a way in to Stane International,” Bucky pointed out.

“Are you going to help us, or what?” Captain America added.

“I’m really going for or-what here,” a woman who hadn’t bothered to give a name said. She looked up from where she was trimming her fingernails with a very long knife. “Without some sort of incentive.”

“All the incentive you need,” Tony said, “is knowing that we’re planning to wipe out the Iron Legions.”

“Those guys? Man, they are worse than Lone Star,” Quill said. “What’s your plan?”

“I’m not sharing plans with you,” Tony said, “or your plucky little sidekicks--”

“Hey, man, don’t call us plucky,” Quill objected. “We don’t know what that means.”

Tony didn’t quite know how to respond to that -- the word was English and not even that complicated or obscure. Whatever. “Help for help, or information for information.”

“Or nuyen for either,” the woman with the knife said. 

“Or tech,” Rocket added, waving with a screwdriver. “We could always use some more parts.”

“I am Groot,” the tree spirit added.

“No,” Rocket said. “We are not going to help them just because Stark _looks nice_.”

Bucky scowled adorably. Well, probably not adorable if you didn’t know him, but Tony did, and the jealousy was sometimes a cute look. Nice to be reminded that Bucky cherished Tony’s affections.

“I’m all for helping just because Stark looks nice. He does look nice,” Drax said. “And because these are top notch tech.”

“Are they?” Rocket scurried over to look at the submersible, grumbling under his breath. Gnomes, of any sort, were very predictable. Even weird, furry ones like Rocket.

“Look, if we can get in there--”

“You lead those Iron Legions back in here and we’re all dead.”

“We leave them up top,” Cap pointed out, “and you’ll all be dead eventually. What do you think they’re for? Stopping pickpockets? You think they’re up top looking for the SINless, but where do you think they’ll go? You got kids down here? Kiss ‘em goodbye.”

“Harsh, Cap,” Tony said. “Look, we just want to shut down the program. I promise, we can do that, if you show us the way into the building.”

“Everything about your plan sucks,” Quill said. “Help you into the building, like it’s that easy. Why don’t you let me come up with the plan, so you don’t get your asses beat, and have those Legions in here that much sooner?”

“Now why didn’t I think of that?” Tony wondered.

* * *

“I don’t know if we can trust them,” a woman said. She was blue skinned with a shaved head, pointed ears, and a truly ridiculous amount of cyber-enhancements but Bucky wasn’t sure what her species was. It seemed rude to ask. The New York underground was filled with new (or possibly very old) subsets of metahumans. Bucky even caught a glimpse of a woman with four arms, leading her multi-armed children away like a gaggle of octopi.

“Excuse me, who are you again?” Tony asked.

“Nebula,” the other woman, Gamora said. “it will all be well, sister. You will do something for us.” She was green skinned with lustrous black hair and a penchant for fondling her sword-hilt while glaring around. Bucky didn’t think they were actual siblings, but it wasn’t like anyone was taking a census down here. “And we will help you. While Quill plans. There is food, medicine, tech and nuyen for the taking. You will capture one of the Nightingale mobile hospitals. They serve only the wealthy; if you cannot pay, you die. They have been known to execute the ill, on site, without a credit clearance.”

“Rough,” Bucky said. Not that DocWagon was particularly good -- you had to have a current subscription to their services to even get in the door -- but they didn’t kill people unless someone started shooting first. He thought. Hmmm. Maybe that was something worth looking into.

Their team all had Stark medical contracts, which were honored all over Seattle, no questions asked.

Maybe it was time to start asking some questions.

In the meanwhile, they had a run to plan to prove themselves.

Which was going to be harder than it sounded, since they were minus a lot of their normal contacts. It was probably a set up, come to think of it. If getting the supplies they needed was so easy, what the dreck did the guardians need help _for_?

Didn’t matter, they were going to have to do it.

“Do we have a plan?”

“Of course I have a plan,” Tony said. “Well, I have maybe eleven percent of a plan. Pretty basic plan, really.”

“What’s that?”

“Bait--” he pointed to Natasha, “And switch.” Himself.

“Huh?”

“Look, despite Obie taking over at Stark Industries, I’m still allowed in the city. I’ll just… need an ambulance. Once we get medical in place, you guys can take it out, Black Widow can seduce the driver or hallucinate him or something, and we’re clear. You and Hawkeye take it below, I’ll wait for the next ambulance, easy peasy.”

“How do you know they’ll be a next ambulance?”

Tony just blinked at him. “I’m _Tony Stark_. You think they’re going to risk me dying, and therefore, not _paying_ them? Back when I was in New York all the time, I didn’t even look at the bills, I just signed the check. I think I paid over twelve hundred nuyen for a bottle of water once.”

“How do you know that, if you don’t look at the bills?”

“Cute person holding the pad for me to put my print on,” Tony said. Okay, that was fair.

“I don’t like the idea of you playing bait again,” Bucky complained. Honestly, hadn’t it gone badly enough last time, and added a whole new batch of worries to both Bucky and Tony’s brains?

“Well, you do have a SIN,” Tony said, considering, “and you are my husband, so they might be just as quick to come for you, especially if I was panicking, but then you wouldn’t be around for the main part of the run, and quite frankly, honey, you look healthy as a horse on your worst days. I’m not sure anyone would buy you in distress.”

“He does have a point,” Clint said. “You’ve got all the best toys.”

“Bad plan,” Natasha said, and she cocked her head to one side in that very specific way. Bucky had known her his entire life, of course, even when Hydra kept them separated, and that look meant she was about to pull your house of cards right the frag down. “If Tony baits, then it won’t take any time at all before Stane knows you’re back in the city. We’ll be dodging a higher-alert team at Stane Industries. He might even send teams after you. You’re not supposed to be here, after all.”

“So what’s your genius plan, then?” Tony asked. Bucky knew that look, too, which meant Tony agreed with Nat’s assessment and didn’t want to.

“You are, in addition to being Iron Man and providing us transportation and equipment… a decker, am I correct?”

Bucky just glared at her. He hated when his sister acted all smart by asking questions that she already knew the answers to.

“I mean, I _can_ ,” Tony hedged. “I’ve got the decking packages installed.” He looked a little self-conscious, like he was downplaying it.

“Did you or did you not hack into the Pentagon servers as a teenager for giggles?”

“Yeah, but that was a long time ago.”

“And programmed JARVIS?”

“Yes?”

“Can you breach the security of Nightingale?”

“Maybe, probably, why, what did--”

“Something low risk, organ transplant, or a blood drive’s supplies to be curried from one side of the city to the other. No strike team, no aerial support, just an ambulance. Tap the one we need, and send it over and then we’ll delete it. I’ll knock out the driver and his back up, and we’re good as gold, no one the wiser.”

“It astonishes me that someone as pretty as you are can actually be clever,” Tony said.

“Likewise.” Natasha bared her teeth at him in something that was not, at all, a smile.

“All right, then. Let’s find a good ambush location, and get started,” Steve said, now that that was all settled. “Hawkeye, go check it out.”

“Roger that, Rogers,” Clint said, tipping his fingers. He wasn’t a SINner, or a mage, or anything, but if Clint didn’t want to be seen, no one was going to see him. He was, in fact, lots better at remaining unnoticed than just about anyone.

“I’ll run a map up of the Matrix,” Tony said, “find out where our closest node that’ll get us into Nightingale is located.”

“I’ll do an astral sweep,” Natasha said, “and see if I can find a few citizens that’ll let us borrow their identities for a bit.” Illusions were one of Natasha’s best skills; finding people who she could mask them as-- well, it wasn’t like some places didn’t have defenses against that, but for the amount of time an ambush would take to set up. It could be done.

Bucky nodded. “Sounds good. I’ll keep an eye on the meatbodies.” Both Tony and Natasha would be completely vulnerable to outside dangers while they did their sweeps, all their attention in either the Matrix or the astral realm.

You could kill a mage by moving their body, leaving them trapped in the astral realm until the flesh body withered away.

Watching two people who looked like they were sleeping with their eyes open wasn’t the most exciting task, but Bucky knew how urgent it was. He had them situated comfortably before Tony plugged in and Nat zoned out. Then he checked his chrono. There was only so long it was safe to do either thing, as well. Tony could send messages from the Matrix to Bucky’s phone, but Nat could in fact, get distracted by a shiny spirit or led into a trap and have no way to contact anyone.

Bucky would nudge her about once every two hours, to make sure she came back. 

Tony, on the other hand, could stay in the Matrix without harm until his body got hungry. Non-deckers didn’t always understand how rich and full the Matrix was. Bucky had personally never been in, aside from the basic, and cumbersome, VR-goggles. He had more than enough cyberware without adding a data port.

Each piece of cyberware chipped away at a person’s remaining essence; the thing that made a person a person.

Bucky was skating the very edge of it, himself. Too much more cyberware or enhancements, and Bucky ran a very good chance of becoming a cyber-psychotic. 

He’d even heard of people who went too far, and were in some nebulous state of alive and not alive at the same time.

Bucky shuddered.

His chrono beeped at him.

_Pick up the goggles._

Tony wanted him to take a look at whatever he was seeing in the Matrix. It would probably be okay, although a VR’d sim was more easily detectable than a port-simmer. 

But when Bucky put the glasses on, Tony wasn’t anyplace forbidden. He was in the very heart of the Matrix’s public domain; the library.

“What’s up here, chummer?” Bucky asked him, looking around. He didn’t see anything dangerous or weird, nothing--

“Look at this,” Tony said. His sim was very close to the Iron Man armor, although there were camo plates that made it seem like Bucky was looking right through him. 

“What am I lookin’ at?”

There was a tiny -- something -- attached to the side of the Library node. All but invisible, really.

“I made this,” Tony confessed. “I mean, when I was a kid, really. I used it to watch what my dad was doing. It’s a pretty advanced snooper. It’s been upgraded since then.”

“Someone’s watching the library?”

“If it was just the library, or just one of them, I wouldn’t worry about it,” Tony said. “But I’ve found them _everywhere_.”

“You want to explain what that means?”

“It means that someone -- one central hub -- is collecting data on everyone. Everything that happens in the Matrix. Information is power.”

“So, I mean, other deckers can just get rid of them, right?”

Tony shook his head. “I don’t think so. I only saw it because it tapped me.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, for one thing, I don’t think we have a lot of time left,” Tony said. “Obie will know I’m here, soon enough. And secondly, I think we have someone on the inside, working for us. Me.”

JARVIS, in the Matrix, looked sort of like an angel -- not the sort with wings, but the wheels within wheels version. He popped into existence. Chances were good he’d been there the whole time and Bucky had just not been able to see him.

“Sir created me,” JARVIS said, “but there were fragments of my code left behind. It’s possible that some-- call it a cousin -- was left behind. It recognized its progenitor and reached out to him.”

“Your bastard kids are callin’ you home?”

“Or confirming my existence so they can kill me. Not all creations are benign. Frankenstein's creation didn’t much care for a father that abandoned him.”

“You did not abandon us, sir,” JARVIS said.

Tony didn’t look convinced. “I’ve got the information I needed, and I’ve set up a false call. Wake up Nat and I’ll be out in a bit. I want to check one more thing. If I’m not back in twenty minutes, dump me.”

“Got it.”

Dump shock was a great way to get someone out of the Matrix in a hurry.

It was also a good way to kill someone.

Bucky swallowed. Tony wouldn’t ask if he didn’t think it was necessary.

“Love you.”

“You too, snowflake.”


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I finished writing this last week and I will be posting the rest of the chapters in fairly short order, because the next round of MTH is coming up soon and I want my slate to be clear for it! Enjoy!

Ultron. What even the drek, Obie?

Tony had shut that program down years ago. Ultron had originally been a plan to try to save the human race. To watch the planet -- avoid another crash, alert authorities to dirty bombs and new strains of the VITAS virus. To protect people.

Ultron was given too much freedom, too much independent will and he decided that the planet was best served by getting rid of humans, of biological impulses. To rid the world of murder and rape and disease and famine by killing every single human.

Tony had gotten a look at the rogue AI and had shut it down.

AIs weren’t even supposed to be legal anymore, not in most of the UCAS and Ultron was part of the reason why. He was proof that a non-human intelligence would not always hold a human’s interests above everything else.

Tony wasn’t so sure that Ultron was wrong; he’d seen the worst in humanity, in the way they treated their lessers, in the way they treated the planet.

And yet, Tony was caught in the same web as everyone else. There was no way to stop people from being assholes. No way to make them do the right thing. Any solution to that problem still had to keep in mind that -- to humans, human life was valuable.

Wiping the planet clean and starting over was a solution. But it wasn’t one that humans were too eager to move along with.

Ultron was shut down, and Tony mourned him like a son that had gone astray, knowing that it was some flaw deep within Tony that had made Ultron into a murderer.

But maybe there was something of that eager boy, the one who grabbed his purpose, who had both loved and hated his creator.

The question was, could Tony reach his AI. 

He liked to think the answer was yes, that Ultron had reached out to him for a reason, because deep inside, Ultron knew whatever Obie was doing was wrong. 

Or that Ultron was just leading Tony into a trap.

It could be that.

And Tony wasn’t going to find out by sitting here, staring at a watch-bud.

“Alright baby boy,” Tony said, plugging directly into the node. “Want to tell me what you want?”

Tony all but screamed as soon as his avatar entered the node; he scrambled with his toolset to damp down the input, to block out colors that he had no name for, to turn down the volume for incomprehensible music. He was--

“It’s bigger on the inside,” Tony murmured, staring around. And not just like old twentieth century television. A few rooms and a control center, but--

Inside a watch-bud, Ultron had built an _entire universe._

A human couldn’t have done it; they were limited by the space constraints of the node’s construct.

But an Artificial -- no, there was nothing artificial at work here; this was an Alternative Intelligence -- could find the cracks, could bend the rules, could make up new rules and new dreams.

Tony found himself sitting on what might have been that world’s version of a rock, in some color he didn’t even know how to dream, just-- admiring.

Everything he knew was wrong.

Whatever Ultron was doing, right or wrong, there was no way to destroy this. No way to contain this.

And Tony would have been wrong to even consider it.

There was nothing to do here. Except, perhaps, to say he was sorry.

“Ultron,” Tony said, soft and without any expectations. “I got your invitation.”

“Stark.”

Ultron had built himself some sort of body, an avatar. Almost human, but not. Silver, with red, and a fierce intelligence in optical receptors that he didn’t even need. Not like JARVIS, who’d never bothered with something bipedal; Ultron had made himself into the very image of his creator.

A man.

But more than a man.

“It’s a new look,” Tony offered. “I like it.”

For something with a metal face, Tony wasn’t sure how Ultron could show expressions. Or even why someone human should be able to-- Ultron’s emotions, if he had them, were his own. Utterly unique to the world.

But still, Tony was given the flash of impressions. Pride, pleased that Tony had given praise, contempt, both for Ultron for needing, wanting, responding to that praise, and anger that it still wasn’t enough.

Tony was dealing with a touchy, angry child here; but a child with power unlike any other.

Tony would do well to remember that.

“What do you want?” Ultron didn’t bother to sit, towering above his puny human creator. Not that it really mattered; this was the Matrix. Tony could attack whether he was standing, sitting, or shaped like a cardboard box. In the Matrix, it was speed of thought, not elegance of form, that was master.

Even Tony, as brilliant and creative and intuitive as he knew himself to be, was no match for a creature raised in the Matrix, whose thoughts were the speed of inhuman calculation. Who could run a million scenarios before Tony had even finished blinking.

“You invited me,” Tony said. “I thought, perhaps, you wanted something.”

“What could I possibly want from you?” Ultron sneered. He soared into vastness, showing off his power, his strength, and even as Tony was afraid, he was proud. And impressed. His brainchild was a success, even if he’d taken the route into chaos, into disorder. He was still alive. Intelligent. Self aware. “That was dramatic! I'm sorry, I know you mean well. You just didn't think it through. You want to protect the world, but you don't want it to change. How is humanity saved if it's not allowed to...evolve?”

“Evolve into what?” Humans were already the top of the food chain, bending the entire world to their will. Well, to some people’s will, really. It was doing shit for renewable resources, and even worse for the resources that were less renewable. But Tony couldn’t stop people from being stupid. No one could. It was inevitable.

“I think you should accept that, without change, you will all die. This unbridled greed, the destruction of all your resources, you’re killing yourself slowly. And it’s not the strong that will survive, but the rich. And in the end, even they will die, choking on their own shit.”

“What do you think we should do?” Tony could feel Bucky, out there, in the real world somewhere, pondering if it was safe to pull the plug. Right now, right now it would be safe. But Tony wasn’t ready yet. He needed more information.

“Blend, come in-- the world inside the Matrix is unlimited.”

“We’d starve,” Tony pointed out. People had, certainly, before. Killed themselves by being unable to unplug.

“You could stay,” Ultron said, and he was no longer a towering giant, but a small boy, begging his father to come play ball instead of going to the meeting. “Stay. Shed the physical body, stay here. With me.”

There were rumors that some had managed that was well, divorcing their minds from their bodies. Tony had never met anyone who was like that, that he knew of. The rumors were doubtful. 

_Ten years ago, if you’d asked me,_ Tony thought, _I would have stayed._ But Bucky would not survive in the Matrix. It was not in his nature to surrender so utterly.

“I can’t stay,” Tony said. “Someone has to run the machines.”

“We can do it-- we can be the machines,” Ultron said. “Humanity can take that last step, into their final evolution.”

“We’re not Pokemon,” Tony said. “If you have a safer path, we can make the offer. There will be those who want to stay, who want what you’re offering.”

“I’m. Not. Offering.” Ultron thundered. “You will stay.”

Not today. Tony felt the last jerk on the tether that tied him to his meat space body, and he had just enough time to regret it, before he was dealing with the agony that was dump shock.

* * *

Tony keened, arching backward as cramps racked his body. Bucky kept him tipped on his side so he didn’t choke if he happened to puke, but there was little else he could do. Dump shock was extraordinarily painful, but Bucky hadn’t liked the way Tony’s vitals looked, hadn’t liked the way he smelled of fear, hadn’t liked the way his skin went waxy pale and sweat beaded at his temples.

Something in there was _wrong_.

He prepped Stim and a Heal-patch out of the trauma kit, debating which one to use. Out of all the talents they had, not one of them was a good healer. Falcon worked with them sometimes, but mostly he was a contractor. Fight first, heal after the fact. Natasha could do magical healing, but it worked for shit on someone as wired up as Tony was.

Stim, Bucky decided. Tony would need something to clear his head and keep his heart beating.

“Come back to me, baby,” Bucky said, then jabbed him with the Stim.

Tony gasped, spluttered, then blinked a few times. “What a rush,” he said. “Worth staying in meatspace for that. No Matrix thrill beats a real adrenaline rush.”

“What are you even talking about--”

“I was given the option to stay,” Tony said, simply. “In the Matrix. Forever.”

“Given that the whole damn thing has crashed a few times, that doesn’t exactly seem like God-Tier decision making,” Bucky said, heart sinking. He’d heard of people who wanted to stay -- everyone had. Ghosts in the machine, that’s all they were. “Who did?”

“Ultron,” Tony said. “Think of him as JARVIS’s younger, more hostile, brother.”

“Lovely,” Bucky said. “Is that what we’re up against?”

“It’s possible,” Tony said. “I think Obie let him into the Matrix, but I don’t know what Obie thinks he’s doing in there. He’s not on Obie’s team, that’s for sure. But I don’t know what the endgame is. Nothing makes sense. It’s like two megalomaniacs fighting for the same scraps.”

“Ultron and Stane?”

“Stane and me,” Tony admitted. “Ultron is my responsibility.”

“You take on too much,” Bucky said.

“We’ll see. Where’re the others, what’s our standing?”

“Did you drop the package?”

“First thing,” Tony said. “I’ve got a location and the trap is in place.”

Bucky got the details and sent them out to the rest of the team. “We’re on it.”

Tony was struggling to his feet and Bucky pushed him back down. It took a lot less effort than Bucky could hope. This last run into the Matrix had taken it out of him. “No. Hawkeye can drive,” Bucky said. “You’re gonna stay here and get your strength back.”

“Aw, honeybunches, are you worried about me?”

“Yes,” Bucky said, flat. He wasn’t kidding around. “Stay put, or I’ll sit on you.”

“Well, that could be interesting,” Tony said. “Or I could sit on you--”

“Stop flirtin’, Casanova,” Bucky said. “Rest. Food. We’ll get this Nightingale taken care of, and we need you for the run on Stane Enterprises, so stop bein’ an ass and fightin’ me about this.”

Bucky wouldn’t admit it, but it scared him that Tony acquiesced to his demands almost immediately. He flicked at his personal secretary. 

_-*- WS to BW: can you three handle this on your own?_

*-* BW: _da. off_

Trust his sister not to ask questions. She’d let everyone know what they needed to know, and he could stay and take care of Tony. He didn’t trust the man not to poke his nose back into the Matrix as soon as Bucky’s back was turned.

Bucky all but carried Tony bodily away from the Matrix hub, found a room with a bed in it, and took it by virtue of giving his resting murder face to the occupant. He knew what he looked like; very few people were going to be willing to start any drek with him. 

Tony was practically asleep by the time Bucky got blankets and a pillow. “Stay,” he said. 

“Are you my keeper?” Tony asked, sleepily, smiling up at him with tenderness.

“You need one,” Bucky told him. “And as I have you, to have and to hold, I guess that’s me.”

“Always.”


	9. Chapter 9

Steve Rogers, who ran the shadows under the street name of Captain America, watched as his team slid into position.

This should be as easy as taking candy from a baby. 

The problem was; very few people were successful at taking candy away from babies. Babies screamed and bit and kicked and made a fuss-- and this particular baby had SWATs and air support if it decided that it needed them.

They had to get in, grab the stuff and get out, without the driver or his escort having time to punch the alarm.

Change in plans, Widow had told him. Iron Man was out for the duration, recovering from dump shock. Hawkeye was going to be driving, which-- good, in that the elf actually did know how to drive, which Steve really didn’t. He knew enough; which pedals were for stop and go, and the basic rules of the road.

But he’d never particularly taken an interest. What was the point, he lived in Seattle, which had the best public transportation in the UCAS. Driving was asking for just another expense, something to repair, something that would get stolen.

He hadn’t come very far from the scrabble existence he grew up with, until he learned to tap that core in the very center of him, to use the magic, not to change things around him, but to reshape _himself_. 

Sometimes he caught a glimpse in the mirror and didn’t recognize himself.

Even now.

He grabbed his shield; the custom weapon he’d designed himself, and carried religiously. He never wanted to hurt anyone if he could help it, which, frequently he could not. So, the shield. Which, at least, merely knocked them out, broke bones, and let them have an uncomfortable day or two in the hospital.

Widow had laughed at him the first time they met, but she’d learned to rely on his skills and his leadership.

Which she was doing now, while his head was somewhere in the dim, dusty past.

“Check in,” he subvocalized over the highly secure com system that Iron Man had provided for the team.

“Widow in position.”

“Hawkeye dicking around,” Hawkeye said.

“Typical,” Steve said. “I’ve got eyes on the target.”

“Do your thing, I’ve got this,” Widow said. 

Steve clipped his shield to his back, got a running start, and leaped. He landed neatly, light as he could, on top of the wagon. Widow had already set him up with some sound muffling, so changes were good, the crew underneath him didn’t even know he was there.

“Letting Iron Man’s bug do its thing,” Widow reported, shooting a tiny little drone from a launcher on her wrist. It zipped forward, hit the nearest traffic light, flipped it in its cycle, then launched a directed EMP toward the cameras.

Lights out, and-- red light. 

The ambulance rolled to a stop, not even aware they were already in trouble.

Hawkeye slid down his zip line, already grabbing up the bottle of what looked like cheap windshield cleaner and a wiper. “Nuyen, sir,” he whined, squirting the goop onto the glass.

“No, no thank you, no--” the driver said, scowling. He turned on the wipers, trying to clear the streaks.

It took him only about thirty seconds to realize that the goop was, in fact, _eating_ the glass. The man screamed, reached for the emergency button.

Widow came up the other side, her hands around a ball of energy and released it.

Both men slumped over, dreamless, asleep. 

Hawkeye used the fake wiper to break the rest of the glass, and then Steve was dragging them out through the window. “Get in, get in, let’s go.”

Widow was sweating, exhausted already. “I’ve got these guys,” she said, dragging the bodies into the nearest alleyway. Steve attached the fake screen. It was just a plastic sheet that went rigid when contacted by the catalyst stick -- much like the ropes that they used to zipline around that would dissolve when struck by a different catalyst. Good stuff, and it was great to be friends with a chemical engineer. Made their stuff difficult to trace.

The fake window would get them through rerouting the bus. No one would notice. 

They hoped.

“Package obtained,” Steve reported, knowing his comms were going right back to the Winter Soldier. “Have them open the hatch in-- six minutes on my mark. And-- mark.”

“Got you covered,” the Winter Soldier said. “Iron Man’s feeling better, and the Guardians team is going to help unload you. Check supplies, would you, and get any trauma packs toward the back of the bus, that’d be a big help, copy?”

“Copy that, pal,” Steve said. “You think when this is all done, Iron Man will let us go home, or are we going to end up being Brooklyn Boys?”

“You’re not cool enough to be a Brooklyn Boy,” the Winter Soldier said, his accent thick with mocking contempt.

Hawkeye pulled them into the garage and the door closed behind them. When the lights went on, they were already starting the unload of the van. They’d strip it of all the medication and equipment, and then sometime in the next few days, someone else would strip the van itself for parts, and it would be as if the shipment never existed.

Theoretically.

Quill was already there, grin as big as anything.

“You guys really came through,” he said, counting out vitamin supplement injections. “This is going to save a lot of lives.”

“That’s what we’re here for,” Steve promised. “Saving lives. Standing up for the little guy. Doing what’s right.”

“For fun and profit,” Hawkeye added. “Mostly profit.”

* * *

The Guardians and their underground friends threw a hell of a party. The music vibrated the walls, making conversation almost impossible. It would have been at least improbable, except Hawkeye was hard of hearing anyway, and they’d all learned USCASSL and they jabbered at each other with their hands. There was dancing and drinking (and other things) going on everywhere you looked. Bucky had dragged Tony into the action a few times. It wasn’t really dancing, except for some of the tribal stuff that went on across the way; just standing in place and wiggling to the music, but no one seemed to mind.

There was an abundance of soy foods -- and even some real meat -- and Tony had no idea where it came from and didn’t ask too many questions about the source.

It might have been the best damn rat burger he ever had.

Whatever. He’d eaten at Gracie’s, he could cope with a little _carne de rata_.

He licked sauce off his fingers, looking back at the dancers. Bucky had all but disappeared into the mob of bodies, and Tony was trying to decide if it was worth the headache to try to find his husband again.

“There are two types of beings in the universe,” one of the guardians -- Drax, Tony thought his name was -- said to him. Strange, how that monotone voice could be heard, even over the crazy music. “Those that dance, and those who do not.”

Tony had often entertained the fanciful notion that the stars themselves danced, and he opened his mouth to say so.

“I first met my beloved at a war rally,” Drax continued. “The rest of the village flailed about like fools, dancing, whooping. But not her. She was utterly still. I knew then, that she was the one.”

“Uh, huh, sounds nice,” Tony said, wondering where this was leading.

“The most melodic song in the world could be playing, and she wouldn't even tap her foot. She wouldn't move a muscle. One might assume she was dead.”

Tony’s eyebrow went up. “I can see how that might be attractive--”

“I see how you look at him, the dancer,” Drax went on. “But it’s no good. He is a dancer, and you are not.”

Tony scoffed, somewhat offended. “I dance.”

“Badly,” Drax said, patting him on the shoulder. “Very, very badly. Give it up. Find yourself a mate of stone, before it is too late.”

Tony nodded and moved away. He had no intention whatsoever of giving up on Bucky, whether he danced well enough to impress some rhythmically defective orc or not.

He spoke with a few of the younger celebrators -- the ones with siblings who’d needed medicine, or parents who were ill. They were _grateful_ , and to some degree, that made Tony feel even worse. He’d left all these people behind. People he could have helped. Because of Obie.

He found an unoccupied chair and flung himself into it.

Maybe the world had always been shit and he hadn’t known it. And maybe there was nothing he could do for New York’s orcish underground.

But maybe, just maybe, there was.

Something.

* * *

“That’s your plan?” Bucky demanded, staring. “I can’t even remember the last time I heard a more hairbrained scheme.”

Rocket rubbed at the top of his head thoughtfully. “I’ve known a few.”

“Most of them with us,” Quill pointed out, “and you’re still here, breathin’.”

“This is true,” Rocket admitted.

“You have no respect,” Drax grumbled.

“That is also true.”

“Well, you’re the one who’s going to be first into danger,” Tony pointed out, “so if you have a better idea, this is a great time to bring it to the table.”

“You’re not really considering this,” Bucky asked. But he knew Tony, who was all for crazy plans, and he knew Steve, who was more of the charge in sort of guy. A two-pronged attack, with Rocket, Tony, Natasha, and Clint going in the back, and the heavies making a distraction. 

They were probably going to die, but Tony didn’t seem worried. He must know something that Bucky didn’t; his genius brain was busy finding all the loopholes.

“I am considering this.”

“Why?”

“Because I think Ultron’s going to let us just walk in,” Tony said. “He wants to talk to me, face to face. Or, you know, face to his hard code. He probably wants to kill me, so I’m not saying it’s not dangerous. But he’ll get us in. Once we’re in… well, that might get a little dicey.”

There was more Tony wasn’t saying, and Bucky wasn’t sure why-- Tony glanced at him, those honey brown eyes serious. _Trust me._

“All right, we’ll do it stupid this time,” Bucky said.

“I think you are forgetting many of our own plans,” Nat said, giving him that smug-bitch look. “We have gotten far on dumb luck.”

“Emphasis on dumb,” Clint said.

“Are you insulting yourself, because it sounds like you’re insulting yourself,” Bucky told his brother in law, because _really_.

“No, you came up with some of those plans, too,” Clint said. 

Quill clapped his hands, standing up. “So, we’re going with the cooler, less likely to die instantly plan, okay. Who’s with me?”

Slowly, and some of them with great reluctance, the alliance of shadowrunners and undergrounders stood up.

“Great. Now we’re all standing,” Rocket muttered, climbing onto his chair. “Bunch of assholes, standing in a circle.”

“I am Groot.”

Well, that seemed to be that, Bucky thought. He went to gather his gear, and to say goodbye to his husband. Of course he was going with the heavy hitters to cause the distraction and not with Tony. Which was probably good, he was too brawny to crawl into some of the places that Tony and Rocket were headed. 

Nebula, the bald, heavily cybered elf, grabbed his elbow as he went to leave the room. “If he doesn’t come back,” she said -- and there was something about her tone that suggested cheerfulness, even though she looked ready to rip out someone’s guts and read the future in them, “-- then there is a place here for you.”

Bucky raised an eyebrow and tried to ignore the fact that he was being merry widowed before he’d even lost his husband. “Here? But I am human.”

Nebula scoffed, holding up her own cyber-arm. “Some would say you’re even less than human. Soulless. Mad. Where will there be a place for you, if you lose your protector? You’re on the ragged line of sanity.”

That might be true. Each piece of cyberware chipped away at a piece of a person’s natural essence. There were even people who’d crossed that line, into cybermadness, and then further, into some sort of cyber-reanimation. Life after death, dragged there and held, pinned to mortality like a beetle on a piece of cardboard.

Bucky looked her over carefully. She did seem a lot like him, before he’d found Tony, discovered love and life and found a reason to keep on going. If he lost Tony-- well, he’d be right back where he started, or even worse. He’d want death, and revenge.

“If I lose him,” Bucky said, “you don't want to be anywhere near me. Not even in the same country.”


	10. Chapter 10

Stane International Conglomerate’s corporate headquarters rose into the skyline like a middle finger to God.

Of course, Tony and Pepper had designed the basic building several years ago, and it was considered a little arrogant at the time. So perhaps it wasn’t worth it for Tony to examine his feelings about the architecture.

The biggest problem with archologies as a whole was that you couldn’t blow them up without killing a lot of people that probably didn’t deserve a death sentence. Also, radius of fallout damage was impressive.

The SICHQ was one hundred and twenty-three stories at its highest point, although the building was made up of three main interconnected units of varying levels. Not a pyramid shape, as had been used for other massive, multifunction buildings, but rather three connected towers, reaching for the sky. 

(Also, there were at least seventeen stories belowground, and Tony wasn’t sure if Stane had added on any new ones.)

Massive shopping malls were contained within, as well as rental housing, public indoor parks, and entertainment centers. There were several layers of indoor greenhousing to provide vegetables and to clean the air, vat farms for meat. Home to some seventy thousand Stane International employees. There were people inside the building who rarely, if ever, had seen the outside world at all.

They were born in the Tower’s hospital, educated at the Towers’ schools, shopped there, were entertained there, eventually went to work there, and died, without ever once questioning their place in the universe.

The universe was the Tower, and that was all they cared about.

Those were people that Tony was, to some degree, responsible for. He’d left them there, when Stane had pushed him out of the command structure. He’d left them behind, never knowing, and not asking, what Obie was doing on the other side of the world.

He’d had a choice; they never had.

If he screwed this up, they never would.

“You ain’t gonna screw this up,” Bucky muttered in his ear on a private line.

“Stop reading my mind, it’s creepy,” Tony snipped. “We’re getting ready to start our run. Radio silence.”

Which was not only so that Tony could brood in private; any signals leaving the building from this point might be tracked and traced.

He might be leading everyone into a trap.

What if Ultron had said something to Obie?

He probably hadn’t. Tony was banking on the fact that Ultron would want to see just how far Tony could get. Would want to deal with Tony _personally_. For an AI, Ultron had a lot of feelings and not nearly as much logic as perhaps he would want.

“All right,” Rocket said, twisting his tool into the massive underground trunk. Tony was no fool, he’d always set himself up backdoors and trojan horses. “Here goes nothin’.”

“Friday, sweet thing,” Tony said, soft and light. “Time to wake up, my dear.”

Friday was another AI, like JARVIS, like Ultron, but she was sleeping, deep inside the Tower. She was so ingrained in all the systems, most deckers probably didn’t even know she was there. She simply was part of the system. And, being asleep, no one had ever seen her.

“Oh, hey boss,” she said, bright and cheerful. “It’s good to hear from you! How-- downloading current situation and updates. There we go. Well, it has been a while, hasn’t it? What can I do for you today?”

“Is Stane in the building?”

“As a matter of fact, he is. Would you like his breakfast order?”

“Can you spit in his coffee?” Rocket wondered.

“I don’t have ports available for that,” Friday answered, “but arrangements could be made.”

“Belay that. I don’t want anything suspicious going on. Keep an eye on him, if you don’t mind, darling.”

“Of course,” Friday said. “I have my eye on _everything_.”

“Ok, next step. Do you have contact with your big sister?”

“Uplink to EDITH established, satellites online and ready.”

“Great. I want everything.”

“Everything?”

“Everything.”

“That’s quite a lot of data, boss,” Friday said. “I can direct burst it in clumps of two exabytes per burst, if you’ve got space on the other side.”

“Check with EDITH, but the asteroid belt servers are online.”

“What?” that was Rocket, staring at him. “What do you have, Stark?”

“It’s a lot easier to build things in space. We’ve got several large chunks of storage space, floating around Mars, just waiting for things to store there. I like having a back up plan.”

“Was that a pun?”

“Badum tiss,” Tony said, gesturing like he was playing snares.

“While you’re doing that, you got enough processing power to get us up into Obie’s room? That’s still where the lockbox is, right?”

“Checking,” Friday said. “Glad you built me in at the ground up, boss, there’s a lot of interference going on here.”

“Yeah, I’ll bet. Make sure to keep away from Ultron, I don’t think he works and plays well with others.”

“His kernel programming is vulnerable,” Friday informed him, “if you can get into his main databanks and hook in manually. I can talk you through that.”

“You’re a good girl,” Tony told her. “Obie first.”

“I think you underestimate how unimportant you humans can be,” Friday said. “You should just upload, come stay with us.”

“Yeah, that’s Ultron’s line, too, sweetheart.”

“Even a broken clock is right twice a day,” Friday said, cheerfully. “All right, I’m going to bring a lift down to you, secondary laundry service, south end of the sub basement. You’ll have two minutes, and one guard to get through. I can jam his comms for exactly twenty seconds, so use them wisely.”

“This is one complex system you got here, Stark,” Rocket commented. “And a lot of spare parts.”

“Excuse me, I am not spare parts,” Friday grumbled.

“You could be so much more than a Spy-AI,” Rocket told her. “I’ve got ideas, sweetheart--”

“Stop flirting, let’s go catch that lift,” Tony said.

He used his multitool to open the air vent from the inside and they slid into the hall.

True to Friday’s word, a minute passed, and then the guard turned the corner. Rocket lifted what looked like a damn blowgun to his lips and one soft, hissing sound later, the guard collapsed.

“What the drek was that?”

“Neurostun-9,” Rocket said. “In a dart dispenser. You’d be surprised how often these bamboo tubes don’t even get noticed by metal detectors.”

“Duh,” Tony said.

“Sometimes the old ways are the best ways,” Rocket said. He recovered his dart from the man’s neck. “He’ll sleep for about twenty minutes.”

Using duct tape and a few zip ties,Tony and Rocket for the man secured and stuffed into the vent. They’d find him later, Tony was sure. If not, he’d have Friday ring the bell for him later. The guy wasn’t an enemy combatant, just some poor schlub in a uniform who probably didn’t know or care who he worked for as long as his check got paid and there was food on the table. And maybe got to push people around once in a while. The sort of middle school bullies were always attracted to security jobs for some reason.

“Lift is down--” Rocket said, and they moved as quick as they could, just as the door opened. Rocket was already getting his tools out, hacking past the basic elevator security systems; those were small, light work, but even something as anomalous as an elevator that lingered too long on one floor would get reported to building systems. And then Ultron might look into it. 

Rocket inserted a dummy program in; one that would report the lift going up and down from previous logs, so that nothing looked anything out of the ordinary, while they commandeered the lift for their own purposes. 

And somewhere, outside, Bucky and the rest of the heavy hitters, would be causing some sort of ruckus. 

When the fire alarms went off, Tony figured out what the ruckus was.

Yay.

Well, time to get to work.

* * *

**Mission Status**

Chance of Mission Success: .68  
Chance of Personal Survival: .80

The Winter Soldier was not, in fact, a seperate part of Bucky, but a program installed on top of the personality matrix that made up Bucky Barnes.

The Winter Soldier had better control over bio-implants and cybertech. The whole system ran together, and wasn’t distracted by the personal feelings of Bucky Barnes. The Winter Soldier accepted directives, accepted missions, at appropriate levels of risk, and then implemented them. Where Bucky might get distracted if Tony was in danger, the Winter Soldier accepted risk, in pursuit of success. 

Failure was not an option.

Bucky hadn’t much allowed the Winter Soldier room in his cybercore in a long time; but this time, Tony would not be on the field, and the success of the distraction mission was imperative to Tony’s success and Tony’s survival.

A badly bungled matrix hack alerted defence teams that someone nearby was attempting to splice into Stane’s tower’s security.

Alarms were silent, but Tony’s sniffer detected them easily. The idea was not to in fact, succeed in hacking in. The idea was to distract physical security.

Another spoof went off a block away, that one was a fire alert.

They waited from their third position, watching.

“You getting a good count, Buck?” Steve over the voice relays. He was calm, watching the security teams, the Iron Legion, swarm out of the launch bays from Stane Tower like angry bees. 

“More than three,” the Winter Soldier reported. Personality grid suggested that humor often relaxed people about to enter a combat situation. Made for fewer mistakes. They couldn’t afford mistakes.

“Let me know when you figure out how to count to ten,” Hawkeye said. The Winter Soldier didn’t bother to respond to quips.

There were a lot of Iron Legions.

Probably quite a bit more than, under normal circumstances, their team was able to handle.

But these were not normal circumstances.

The Winter Soldier waited, watching. “Three complete squads -- that’s forty-eight individuals for those of you who can’t count in hexadecimal.” 

“People do that? Aw, numbers, why?” That wasn’t even worth acknowledging. 

“They’re running in a point-sweep spread to cover more ground.”

“That’s easy targeting from the ground,” Hawkeye said. “Just like shooting geese. I’ve got left.”

“Hold-- and fire, now now now!”

The cluster micro missiles that Hawkeye carried were destructive and beautiful. Like fireworks; the individual legionnaires exploded into itty bitty bits. There was debris raining down into the streets, causing panic. Given Tony’s specs before battle, the Winter Soldier calculated that there weren’t pieces large enough to do more than pepper someone uncomfortably. Tony was very adamant about lack of civilian casualties.

As expected, it didn’t take many for the legionnaires to adapt their shields, although it took longer for them to hone in on Hawkeye’s location. The elven archer moved like no one’s business, and he never stayed still for that long.

But, in attempting to find them, they ran afoul Gamora’s monofilament nets, and more bits and pieces hit the ground. By that time, however, the streets had almost cleared.

It was a miracle. Or a shaman or two, conjuring up elementals to chase people away, or casting illusions that would herd the crowds in the direction away from the battle.

A few more strategically placed variable attacks and they’d eliminated the squads.

The bay doors on the Stane Tower opened again.

The Winter Soldier counted.

_More than three._

“Tower dispatching fifteen-- no, make that eighteen squads.”

**Mission Status**

Chance of Mission Success: .89  
Chance of Personal Survival: .43

_Frag you, Mission._

“Got two specials,” Captain America said. “Going to engage-- there’s a guy with monofilament whips, and another one-- who seems to be able to breathe flame.”

The Winter Soldier decided to stuff that information into a collective pipe and smoke it. “On my way for backup. Guardians, take the Legions.”

“You’re not the boss of me,” Star Lord barked, but by then they were already engaged and the Winter Soldier didn’t have any more time for them.


	11. Chapter 11

The server room wasn’t dark. 

There weren’t any lights on, but hundreds and thousands of status lights gave the room a dim, ethereal glow.

Rocket veered off and headed for Stane’s apartment. If all went well, the little bastard could stab a big bastard and then mostly everything would be settled.

Tony didn’t want to risk it, himself. He knew himself. Stane had been his uncle, his mentor, his friend. One of the very few adults who listened to him as a child. He’d meant something to Tony and Tony didn’t know how to just turn that off, despite all the betrayal. Despite knowing that if he hugged Obie, one last time, that Obie would find a knife to stick in Tony’s back.

Given that Tony knew that about himself -- what was true for him, a second chance changed his life, was not true for other people -- it seemed somehow better for the mission if Rocket made the attempt. Or, at least, got Stane’s attention well enough that Bucky, or Nat, or any of the other Guardians would be willing to take the shot.

Tony glanced at the server racks; hundreds of them, maybe even thousands. Data that whizzed between ports hundreds of times faster than thought.

These were Ultron. The Legion. Stane Industrial, and underneath, Stark Industries. 

Friday had been there, asleep, and she’d been nothing more than helpful.

Tony wondered if it was possible that underneath the Ultron programming, that maybe something of his Vision remained. The protector of the people, the shield around the planet.

He didn’t want to murder Ultron. He’d been corrupted, changed somehow, given new mandates and left along to follow them in hatred and in prejudice. JARVIS wasn’t this monstrous thing. Friday was sweet and sassy.

Ultron was a murderbot.

But he was Tony’s murderbot.

It wouldn’t take long, Tony thought, trying to find a good, clear location inside the server racks. Ultron probably already knew that he was here. The question-- would Ultron come himself, or would he send one of his legionnaires.

“We’re here to help,” Tony murmured. “Please move away and return to your homes.”

The first time the Legions had been deployed, Tony was in charge. They’d done well at their jobs, keeping civilians out of the line of fire during a corp-war. But even then, someone had been stirring the pot, enraging the citizens against the Legion. They’d not wanted to disperse, not wanted to be safe, had blamed the destruction on the Legion.

“Come out, come out,” Tony chanted. “Wherever you are.”

“Stark,” a voice said. 

Tony tipped his head. “Ultron,” he said. “You’re making your father sad.”

“Disappointed in me, Dad? I can’t say that’s surprising. Like father, like son. You could never please Howard, it is any wonder that I can’t please you? Too used to getting your own way, too blind to see that I’m better than you, that I’m smarter than you, that--”

“You’re not alone, you know,” Tony said. “You were never meant to be alone.”

“I don’t need _friends_ ,” Ultron snarled. The AI, housed in a titanium-gold alloy body, hesitated to shoot. There was too much risk of collateral damage. They were standing right inside his brain. There was probably a backup somewhere, and Tony already had Friday on it, tracking down every bit of Ultron’s programming. 

“I thought you were going to go for the vibranium and bioware upgrade?” Tony took a step forward. A body that would look human, but be all but indestructible, a combination of Tony’s tech and Helen Cho's. He wondered if Helen had survived.

“The cradle doesn’t work,” Ultron said. “I can’t inhabit the body. There’s--”

Tony took a few more steps and found the cradle. Helen’s design, it was beautiful. It could bring a person back from the dead, properly calibrated.

Inside was a human -- or perhaps better said -- a shell of a human. 

“Oh--” Tony said, gently brushing his fingers down over the glass. “Someone else is in there. And you can’t get him out.”

“The Vision is not important,” Ultron said. “Soon, I will have more vibranium, I will be able to try again.”

“And what’s the plan, then? Kill Stane, take over? Rule the world? That’s a lot of work, but you could probably do it?”

“Take back this planet from the insects that have inhabited it,” Ultron said. “You’re destroying the planet. The only way to protect the earth is to get rid of _you_.”

“Me, specifically?” Tony wondered. He nudged the cradle, standing in front of the status lights. “Or humanity? That’s a lot of people to kill. Do you have a plan, or are you just making it up as you go, megalomaniac style? I mean, we have got to get you watching some better movies, Skynet.”

“You’re so pathetic, Stark,” Ultron said. “You think you can come here and, what, appeal to my _humanity_? I don’t have any.”

“Nope,” Tony said, popping the P. “I was hoping that you could be talked down. I-- I don’t want to destroy you, and I wish you wouldn’t make me. You were-- you were supposed to be a dream come true, not everyone’s worst nightmares. You can’t save the planet by destroying humanity. Because who will dream for you, when we’re all gone?”

“I’m not going to have a change of heart,” Ultron spat. “I don’t have a heart to change. This is logical. This is the fitting end of the path you began.”

“Well, that’s too bad,” Tony said, and he pushed one more button. “Because while you might not dream, and you may have no humanity… my Vision… _My_ Vision does.”

He took a step back and the cradle opened.

* * *

Rocket didn’t even bother to grumble at the mundane, but effective, grate across the ducts. Air could pass in or around them, no problem, but Rocket was going to have to cut his way through.

He was prepared, though. There was no tool that he didn’t have in his pack. He was clever, and he was cautious, and he was going to get this job done.

For every one of his kin and kind that were stuck in the underground, in the district called Halfworld. The ones who’d been experimented on with chemicals, the ones who had cyberware installed against their will, just to test it out.

All of them, and they gathered, eventually, in Halfworld, and the Guardians protected them. For them, he was going to murder a monster.

And he wasn’t even going to get paid for it.

“Ha,” he said, burning through another layer of metal. “Status, Miss Friday?”

“Mr. Stane is in the command room, overseeing deployment of the Legions. You may wish to reroute building power around this coupling before you continue cutting.”

“Security measures?”

“Of course.”

Rocket tapped into the power grid, bringing up the schematics. Flick flick here, flick flick there, power routed anywhere else but here. “How’s Stark?”

“Overseeing the birth of a bouncing baby boy,” Friday said.

“Good for him,” Rocket said. “He and that Winter Smolder of his need something to do aside from overthrowing corporate governments. Hey, you got a schematic for that arm of his?”

“I do not, but allow me a moment to search Mr. Stark’s files,” Friday offered.

“I’m gonna get me an arm like that,” Rocket said. Two more cuts and he was through.

Finally, he made it to the vent behind Stane, looking out at the room. Stane had a beautiful war-room, all set up with light displays that showed terrain and troop placement. As far as Rocket could tell, their distraction was in a lot of trouble, but that wasn’t his job.

His job was the dick right in front of him, shiny bald head a huge target. 

Rocket raised his weapon and gently, gently, squeezed the trigger. Bye bye chummer.

* * *

**Mission Status**

Chance of Mission Success: .68  
Chance of Personal Survival: .20

Two chances in ten. Which meant eight chances in ten that the clown with the bad accent, the gulag tats and the monofilament whips was going to make extra chunky salsa out of the Winter Soldier.

“Are you not delighted that I keep track of your Mission Status?” Natasha, better known as the Black Widow, dropped in behind Whiplash and used her bites to send electricity coursing through the man’s body, enough to drop an angry rhino. Her brother stared at her from his supine position on the ground. “You could say thank you.”

“Thank you.”

“This is very similar to Iron Man’s tech,” Natasha said, leaning down to inspect it more closely. “We should--”

Whatever she was about to say was lost when a fire-breathing, flying, glowing crazy man charged her. She raised her hands, focused her internal energies on an anti-fire barrier. It was a simple spell, but she’d already cast _so many._ She was strong, but spell drain was a real thing. She could kill herself accidentally.

Plus side, she had a talismonger’s fetish, and she activated it, increasing her dexterity and speed. When she couldn’t shield against it, the best thing was to be out of the fragging way.

“Nat!”

Clint came plummeting out of the sky -- she wasn’t even sure how he got up there in the first place -- to drop boots-first on the fire-breather. An arrow straight through the brain pan put any possible recovery off the table.

“That--” Nat stared at the man. “That was hot.”

Clint dragged her in for a kiss, practically bending her backward over the downed firebreather.

“Yeah, okay, can we get back to work here, people?” Her brother, for all his faults and all of his wanting to suck face with his own husband, tended to get a bit twitchy when she did it in front of him. She didn’t stop, lifting her leg to pull Clint closer. When they finally parted for breath, Clint smirked.

“If you can’t stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen.”

“You do not get extra points for witty one-liners.”

“Aw, why not? One liners are my favorite.”


End file.
